Blue Star Chronicles

Have you ever seen the Northern Lights? Aurora Borealis? I saw them once. It was one of those events that you don’t forget. Waves of color slow danced across the night sky one cold and clear night when we lived up north. Our paths crossed that one cold and clear night by sheer coincidence because the lights were further south than usual and we were further north than usual.

We almost missed seeing it. Our Soldier Son was playing outside as he almost always was. It didn’t matter how cold it was, he was outside playing. He was in elementary school. Our daughter was upstairs in her room. My Beloved Curmudgeon and myself were in our den just watching television. Our son came running into the house to excitedly tell us that we needed to come outside and see the Northern Lights. We smiled and told him that we weren’t far enough north to see the Northern Lights, it was undoubtedly something else he was seeing. Perhaps it was the trail of an airplane reflecting the moonlight or something along those lines.

He went back out and came back in again. He kept insisting it was the Northern Lights and we kept explaining that it couldn’t be. My Beloved Curmudgeon had been born and raised in Michigan and had never seen the Northern Lights that far south. It just wasn’t what our son thought it was. Soldier son got more and more frustrated. Finally, I condescended to go outside and look. I was just going to pacify him. I didn’t really want to go outside because my southern genes just flat out rebelled at the very idea of adjusting my body temperature to anything that would come close to adjusting to the climate of Michigan. But I did go out just past the porch door to look at the sky so I could reassure my son that it wasn’t the Northern Lights he was seeing.

When I looked up to the sky I did indeed see the Northern Lights. I could barely believe it. I stepped back in and told my daughter and husband to come out. So there we stood in our driveway on that cold Michigan winter night watching a light show that could only have been produced by the hand of God. It was spectacular.