meteor shower

The paths from the main camp area are meandering, and I find myself wondering how we haven’t become completely and utterly lost. But my counselors and my best friend know exactly where they are going, and they lead us out onto a small beach, littered with beach chairs and beach toys that have known beautiful summer days.

And it takes me several minutes to notice the sky; when I finally do, it is like I have never seen the sky before.

Above me, the fan of darkness is sprinkled with dots of light, so many it’s staggering. They are warm, and friendly, but so cold and far away that it hurts to turn my eyes from them. I feel my way toward an empty chair, my mouth hanging open, eyes wide.

“It’s beautiful,” I whisper, because I am not the only one on this beach. I slip my sandals off and dig my toes in the sand, curling them around pieces of bark or stick or shell which I find. The sand is cold, and it is a nice change from the heat my sandals have created from walking in them.

“Did you know,” says my counselor AJ, “That the closest star is millions of miles away?”

And before anyone can reply, there is a chorus of whispered exclamations; someone has seen a shooting star.

Of course, my eyes so trained on each star individually, I miss the sight completely. This is when I remember that I have never seen a shooting star in my life.

Some people said they saw seventeen shooting stars that night, others, twenty three. Me, I only saw one, and it was a vivid, dying star, which shook me to my bones and made the night triumphant in my eyes. It tore itself from the pattern of the stars and crossed through the atmosphere, gone in almost an instant; but so magical, so singularly silence, that I had to try not to cry.

Later, when we trudged back to the campsite, past the canoes which we had paddled for hours in to get to this island, I set up my sleeping bag outside, next to Brady. We could see the light from the tents, and the light from the campfire, and we could hear the vague quiet murmurs of friends turning into sleep.

It was the first night I slept under the stars. And when I woke up the sky was a blur of deep, nature green and the clearest blue I had ever seen, and in the night my feet had fallen asleep.

For breakfast, for the first time, I had marshmallow pancakes and chocolate covered chex mix, and then I sat by the lake and read while my friends swam.

That was a pair of days for firsts.