As our tiny earth makes its yearly 584,040,000-mile long journey around sun, we get a different view of the universe. If you go out and look at the stars, you will notice that things are changing up there. All the bright stars of Orion are scrolling to the west, and new ones are coming up in the east.
Just after it gets dark, look for a bright orange-colored star coming up in the east. To be sure you have the right star, look above and to the left for the Big Dipper almost standing on its handle. Follow the curve of the handled to that bright star which is called Arcturus.
Notice that the name sounds like our word Arctic. Both come from the Ancient Greek word Arktos, which means bear. Our word Arctic means land of the bears, while Arcturus means guardian of the bears.
Why did bears end guarding? In ancient times the bears, our Big and Little Dippers were people. They fell out of favor with the gods and were placed in an unfavorable orbit in the sky. The orbit prevented them from setting in the ocean where thy could rest. Arcturus kept them in that position in the sky.
Arcturus is an old star, much older than our sun. It has evolved into its red giant phase like the red star Betelgeuse in the constellation Orion, which is supposed to blow up in the not-too-distant future.
Hopefully Arcturus does not explode, as it is a lot closer to us than Betelgeuse. Don’t stay awake at night worrying about it. Astronomers are not expecting anything scary to happen with Arcturus.
Just hanging around
The weirdest thing about Arcturus is that astronomers think it is not a permanent resident in our starry neighborhood. They are calling it a guest star.
Here is what is going on. We live in a galaxy with hundreds of billions of other stars. Think of it as a giant merry-go-round with all those stars dutifully going in the same direction. Arcturus, however, is going against the flow at right angles to everybody else. Arcturus is barreling across the galaxy at 500,000 miles an hour. Years from now and it will be out of sight.
Looking up at Arcturus, think how amazing it is that it is flying by us at the time when intelligent life on this little planet has developed enough so we can see it and recognize what it is.
Astronomers are telling us that a bright comet is going to sail right by us in April. We will be able to see it in the daytime. We will have to wait and see what happens with this comet. I will keep an eye on it and let you know if anything amazing is happening.
The planet Venus is climbing up higher in the western sky just after sunset. It is getting a lot easier to spot in the west not long after sunset, but before it gets completely dark.
