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Lo, A Rose

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Imagine you’re a long, long way from home.

This government job you have takes you on the road pretty much 365 days a year. It seems there’s no plan to bring you back .. ever! That would be a deal-breaker for many.

“You can work me to the edge of exhaustion,” you imagine yourself telling your overlords, “but don’t keep me at the office on Mother’s Day.”

Unfortunately, the Cassini Spacecraft doesn’t have the option of making such a demand because “the office” is a vast airless vacuum all around the giant planet Saturn. And Mother’s Day? Not a big observance for machines that are not born as much as they are imagined, designed and assembled by teams of engineers.

Still, I’d like to think that even a bag of bolts can feel wistful, so it seems fitting that our lonely wanderer Cassini found and beamed back this lovely rose – beautiful to look at but maybe not so wonderful to experience first hand.

Saturn_Rose

This lovely flower swirling around the North Pole of Saturn is 1,200 miles across. Forget for a moment that the deep crimson folds could be traveling at 330 miles per hour. A pretty thing is still a pretty thing, even if touching it would peel the skin off you.

Still, picture the excitement of two space scientists as they spotted this one in the viewfinder! Particularly if it was around Christmas and they were in the habit of conversing only to the tune of “Lo, How a Rose Ere Blooming.”

It could happen!

!) Lo, there’s a Rose on Saturn.
At least it looks like one to me!
That clearly is the pattern.
What other flower could it be?
That’s no geranium!
It needs some fertilizer.
For it is … so far from the sun.

2) Let’s not begin debating
whether Saturn has a rose.
You are hallucinating.
This much everybody knows –
A flower can’t survive
in space’s icy regions
where nothing remains alive.

3) What fragrance has this blossom,
So bright and beautiful and fair?
From here it looks so awesome!
Vibrant and fresh, though without air!
It decorates the sky.
The gentle Rose of Saturn
As seen through Cassini’s eye.

http://youtu.be/JYecrfQjEJU

When have you seen something that wasn’t really there?

53 thoughts on “Lo, A Rose”

  1. Good morning. A poem, a tune, and that remarkable picture from from space. That’s an amazing combination that could only be found in a blog entry put up by you, Dale.

    I suppose I have seen a lot of things that weren’t really there. What comes quickly to mind is glimmering spots in roads that look like water from a distance and disappear when you get close to them. They are seen on hot days in the summer. I would guess that all of us have seen those.

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  2. Rise and Shine Baboons!

    This is a Mental Status Exam, right? You are testing my contact with reality, right?

    I never see things that aren’t there! Heh, heh, heh. Fooled you.

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    1. Jacque, what do you mean by “Heh, heh, heh. Fooled you”? Did you fail to get enough sleep last night or, perhaps, are you in need of a Mental Status Exam?

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    2. Reminds me of that long psych test (MMPI?)… the one in which you spend more time trying to figure what each answer will imply about you than you do actually answering the question!

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  3. James Thurber wrote about the interesting things he thought he saw when wasn’t wearing his glasses. Noble looking dogs turned out to be bags that had blown into a park. My father had hallucinations when he was on morphine, thinking he saw a person jump out of the window of his hospital room. I hope I don’t see things that aren’t really there when I am doing a diagnostic interview or psychological evaluation. That could be damaging to the client and embarrassing to myself.

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  4. I’d prefer to believe that I haven’t seen things which weren’t there, but this morning I have an emergency visit with a neurologist who is definitely seeing things that are not there. I had my 24-hour EEG two days ago and got this urgent call from the neurology nurse yesterday telling me that the doc wants to see me first this the next day. “Why?”, I asked. She said, “Your EEG shows that you had THIRTY seizures in one day!!” WHAT?! Wouldn’t I know if I’d even had one????

    This shocking news had me calling my best friend. With her firm but gentle help, we figured out how it was that the EEG made the mistake of reading “seizures” where there were none. I’d seen three clients, had numerous phone dialogues, worked on my book, and generally had an “on my game” day, after all. The EEG tech had warned me to try to refrain from chewing Nicorette gum because it could override the brain wave recording. Well – I DID try, but the reality was that after 29 years of always having a piece in my mouth, I clearly failed to chew it subtly enough for this highly-sensitive test! I then googled “EEG test/chewing gum” and immediately got confirmation that my gum habit had blown this test. I only hope the neurologist agrees with me in about an hour!

    I feel quite foolish about all of this – worse, I’ll probably have to retake the damn test only go through gum withdrawal this time. My worst fear is that she’ll tell me there’s some very exotic subtype of epilepsy that I’ll have for life and not go for “the gum screwed up the results” line I’ve been rehearsing. Still, I simply reject that I (or anyone) could actually have 30 seizures and be totally unaware of it. She definitely saw something that isn’t there! More later………….

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    1. I have always marveled at what a neurologist can see in an EEG, and I wonder what the general accuracy rate is in reading an EEG.

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    1. I thought I saw some discouraging things in the same place. Unfortunately, I don’t think I was seeing a mirage although some people seem to act as if they they don’t see these things.

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  6. I’m sure there was a boy/young man or two in my past – I had convinced myself that he liked (teenage) or loved (later on) me, based on no more than smiles, kind words, and wishful thinking!

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  7. The comments about being away from home on a government job reminded me of this:
    http://xkcd.com/695/

    Then when it turned out you _were_ talking about a space ship, I had to laugh.

    Beautiful picture. Thank you.

    Tom A.

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    2. Awwww! I saw that xkcd comic when it was first posted, and it made me sad. But then, I talk to inanimate objects, and do things like apologize to my car when I hit potholes. That might be part of the reason I became pagan, so I’d have a philosophical excuse for the habit: “No, I’m not crazy, I’m an animist/pantheist!”

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      1. My mother was a fantastic animist, CG. If the toaster began performing erratically, my mom would unplug it and set it aside in hopes it would feel better in a day or two. You won’t be surprised to hear that she would talk to machines, expecting them to hear and understand.

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  8. Cloud watching! I see all kinds of things in clouds, but quite a lot of dragons, for some reason–mostly Asian ones, which is appropriate, as they’re rulers of rain.

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  9. The only thing I remember seeing that probably wasn’t really there (emphasis on *probably*) was an angel I saw in our house one night. As a child I had no doubts about what I’d seen. Later I began to grant that the sighting didn’t make a lot of sense, as the angel was only fiddling with a little cuckoo clock in the living room, which hardly seems like a sound reason to appear to a child. I remember she was pretty . . . in a diaphanous sort of way.

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    1. I heard strange sounds when I lived in an old farm house. At the time I thought I might be hearing ghosts. I didn’t see any ghosts.

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  10. I see things that aren’t really there almost daily, usually when I close my eyes to sleep. Visions appear on the inside of my eyelids, rather amoebae-like visions that change and transform from one image to another. It’s often faces which can transition from a young woman with curly hair and glasses through various stages of aging until it resembles Munck’s Scream. It can be animals of all kinds and landscapes; even intricate design patterns. I wish I had a way of photographing these visions as they’re really fascinating. I’d like to scrutinize them longer but they are very fleeting. To be honest, on most days these visions a whole lot more interesting than what I actually see when I’m awake. Today of course, I’m enjoying the first daffodils and tulips that have sprung into bloom in my garden..

    I’m not imagining this, today is Ben’s birthday. Happy birthday, Ben; may your celebration on this glorious day include cake and nice surprises.

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    1. Happy birthday, Ben. As we consider the rose-like image on the blog today, I think it would be fitting to wish you a rosy birthday.

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    2. I didn’t know for certain that anyone else had that experience, of seeing images at night when I first close my eyes to sleep. In my case, I tend to see patterns, brightly colored and fleeting. I think, first of all, you have to be expecting to see with your eyes closed. Otherwise you unconsciously turn off your visual apparatus. And it’s different from imagining or dreaming in that I don’t feel as I have any agency whatsoever in what I’m seeing and what I see doesn’t have any meaning per se. The closest I can come to a parallel is when you watch a fireworks show. You wait receptively, but without any control over what appears. Of course the patterns I see are much subtler than fireworks and it almost seems as if they only appear when I refrain from willing them to do so. The color combinations are nothing I would ever consciously imagine. It’s very entertaining…

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      1. Very interesting, bill. I don’t have any control over the images either, they usually have nothing to do with anything I’ve experienced during the day. What I love about them is that they are so full of surprising twists and turns, nothing that I would ever have the creativity to fabricate if I tried. Occasionally the visions are in bright colors but more often than not they are very subtle and dark.

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  11. Sorry to cause concern to people. We are dealing with a very private and time-consuming and energy-sapping issue, two actually. Do not be concerned by my absence. We are dealing with things

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    3. Thanks for letting us know, Clyde. Wishing you a speedy resolution to your issues whatever they may be.

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  14. Following up on my rather cavalier morning post about blowing the EEG test here………….I got bad news today. The neurologist said she’s rarely seen so many seizures on an EEG and that this is quite serious. This constant seizure activity can, at any moment, trip a grand mal event – and this can cause permanent brain damage. I figure my brain’s already damaged enough without blowing the circuits out altogether! Apparently, my number of seizures in one day “(over 30) scared” my good doctor.

    Toward the end of the appointment, I got up enough nerve to ask the “big” question: “Are you saying that I’m epileptic?” She said, “Yes” and I burst into tears. My upbeat, nonchalant demeanor melted away quickly. It’s still a bizarre concept that I can be seizing every hour, yet fully functional, alert, and present to the people in my life – clients, friends, family. As of now, I’m on
    heavy-duty mega doses of an anti-seizure medication which, in itself, may be a big problem. The side effects include: depression, anxiety, crying spells, fatigue, irritability, and suicide. The ironic thing about this is that these are pretty much what i treat in my clients. Also not lost on me is the fact that these states are really familiar to me.

    In a couple of hours after getting this news, I was actively repairing myself. If I’m good at anything, I’m good at this chore!

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  17. sorry for the news cb i hope you find the new life changes to be good ones and all goes well.
    sorry clyde, hope the circle of life gets off the flat spot soon. do your best in the meantime
    happy birthday ben i have a present for you
    http://www.ukuleletricks.com/somewhere-over-the-rainbow-ukulele-chords/
    enjoy your day and the coming year.
    bill and pj i raise my hand and join the club. i realized when i was 2 that if you rub your eyes and look at the lights you can do a light show like a kalaidascope. i asked my mom about how that works and she had no idea what i was talking about. my first inkling that i may have some parts of life to live on my own.
    in my formative years i would have roundtables with mentors who rotated a bit but lincoln gahndi and jesus usually came around . they had interesting things to say. its nice to get advice from your wiser friends.
    when i read the question of the day i thought it referring to things like the light at the end of the tunnel. i see it and keep heading that way but it stays way the heck out there.
    i love billy joel. his energy and the way his songs can twist and pivot and come back around is some of my favorite stuff. his balads are wonderful too. the boppsie stuff will get to you after a while but you gotta love him.
    good places to eat. we tried to find good places in vegas this week and had some success with local hole in the walls but also missed on a couple. around here i enjoy hells kitchen, pizza luce
    fuji ya, and remembering danopolis is a smile. it was there just two or three years ago, i think the same waitresses may have had the same hairdos with the same hairspray in place. just keep shellacing it over the older stuff. good reading baboons thanks. nice coverage on the news this morning dale. the speeches from the republicans and democrat in the house after passing it on to the senate on route to the gov. i hope pawlenty is having a nice time forgetting about the 6 bilion dollar deficit and the going backwards for a multi term stint. theres no place like home. and if you cant see it just close you eyes and click your heels three times. theres no trail like home theres no trail like home theres no trail like home and poof you are here where the flying monkeys never come and youre never just a nuthin with you head all full of stuffing

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  18. Dream On

    Gonna meet some sweet lover
    she’ll be so wise and so kind
    Love her ’til we’re a hundred ‘n’ seven
    Body ‘n’ the soul an’ the mind.

    That’s right, dream on,
    Little dreamers
    Dream on
    This world ain’t what you think it is
    It’s just what it is!

    OK, I will meet some nice person
    In a quiet little cafe
    We’ll make such sweet love that the birds will applaud
    And then we’ll go on our understanding ways.

    Good luck, dream on,
    Little dreamer
    Dream on.
    The world ain’t what you think it is
    It’s just what it is!

    The president he gonna start laughin’
    Pass to the general a toke.
    All the world bigshots gonna lay down their guns
    And say “hey folks, it was all just a joke!”

    (spoken with jazzy fingersnapping)
    Bombs & stuff?
    Droppin’ on you?
    You know we would’n’ do that to you.
    We’re the leaders-of-the-world
    We’re the real cool guys
    We’re elected, respected, we try to be wise
    We’re not gonna drop a bunch a’ bombs on everybody, blow up the whole world
    over some little political difficulty or border dispute or somethin’
    Us leaders-of-the-world we’r’ like all you people,
    Jus’ to sit back, relax, take it easy….

    Dream on, little dreamers
    Dream on.
    The world ain’t what you think it is
    It’s just what it is.

    I ‘as feeling kinda troubled ‘n’ upset ‘n’ confused ‘n’ out of it.

    You know how that goes? Time goes along……….. things change, you wake
    up some mornin’g ‘n’ you realize that you’re jus’ out of it,

    I find mysel’ at some friend’s apartment on a nice spring day, little birds
    be singin’ in the trees?……… All my friends, they be sittin’ aroun’
    inside……… They was gittin’ kinda out of it too, I guess, but, seemed
    to be workin’ out awright for ’em……. They be sittin’ aroun’ in a
    little apartment watchin’ TV, you know, on a nice spring day……….
    they’d be watchin’ like reruns of “Three’s Company”, stuff like
    that…….. They be laughin’, you know, jus’ havin’ a great time. I
    didn’ get it…….. So I knew I must be kinda outta sync, ‘n’ outta
    swing……… I need a little bit a’ help.

    Well, jus’ luckily for me, the great Swami, Prisnidadirapi was comin’
    through town……. (I think he was on his way up to Boulder, Colorado, or
    somewhere.) He was givin’ a li’l advice as he went by ‘n’ I went to see
    the guy………. ‘n’ in so many words I said to him: “I’m in bad shape
    here………. An’ I heard you got the true knowledge, which you c’ld give
    to me, which w’ld clear up all my doubts and difficulties, ‘n’ git me back
    on the track, back in the swing, fully adjusted to life in the 20th
    century……. An’ the only trouble I heard about, Swami, is you charge
    about eight hundred dollars fer the true knowledge…………. That’s all
    right, I mean…….. I never expected there to be a blue light special on
    enlightenment or anythin’ like that, but I….. I’m just a guitar player,
    your holy Swaminess, an’ I was hopin’ we could make a deal where…… I
    would give you, like, maybe, four hundred dollars……..an’ I was hopin’
    maybe you would give me, like, jus’ maybe half of the true
    knowledge?……..Jus’ enough to git me by for a month or six weeks at the
    most, ‘n’ I’ll give you the rest of the cash……… you give me the rest
    of the knowledge, I’ll be enlightened, your pockets’ll be a little heavy,
    we both be doing awright, whaddaya say?”

    Well, the Swami, he looked at me from under his heavy-lidded eyes,…his
    mysterious eyes…… He smiled at me……… That was nuthin’ new, you
    know, the Swami was always kinda smiling……… Like he knew sumpin’
    that you didn’t know…… Like those people that………… they jus’
    levitate jus’ a lit’l bit, you know, ‘n’ they git a little smile on their
    face…….

    He smiled……… He looked at me ‘n’ he said:

    “Dream on, little dreamer
    Dream on.
    This world ain’t what you think it is
    it’s jus’ what it is.”

    This quiet rain will always continue
    Our kids will always think we’re great
    The world won’t keep reeling like a poor drunken fool
    Who’s lost an’ upset an’ too late

    Dream on, little dreamers,
    Dream on.
    This world ain’t what you think it is,
    This world ain’t what you wish it was,
    Uh, the world
    Ain’t what you think it is
    It’s just
    What it is.

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    1. greg brown from his first album live at cedar riverside. i lost the damn album but i still hear it playing earworms in my head

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    2. At first I thought maybe you were writing this, tim, but then I realized there was WAY too much punctuation.

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