That Big Kid Ellen #42: Go to a planetarium
I’m going to be honest about something that’s sometimes taboo to talk about… I wish that I was religious.
I know this post is about planetariums, but stick with me for a moment.
I often imagine the comfort that believing in a religion brings to most of the people on this planet, and I just feel so envious. To have faith that things truly happen for a reason. To have faith that we have souls that persist after this physical life. To have rhythm in a weekly routine, to have a community, to have customs and traditions. To know that everything will be exactly as it’s supposed to be.
To truly be a part of something bigger.
I want that. I want that desperately.
I was raised Catholic, and while I do believe that going to church and Sunday school for the entirety of my childhood molded me into a more-than decent human being, I always had a reasonably-sized nugget of doubt in the back of my head and never really believed that the stories that I was being told were real.
Like, it would be cool if some guy turned water into wine, what an incredible thing for someone to do. But I always viewed it as a beautiful metaphor about the power of love and sharing with those in need. Same with the arc — we’d have some seriously inbred species on Earth if every animal came from just one pair. Also… physics and math aren’t on the side of the arc story. It’s a metaphor about resilience and faith.
The teachings were always consistent — help and care for others, do not commit crimes, etc — and that was comforting. But I was also aware of the shortcomings of religion — guilt, shame, damnation. I often think that these things are the reason why Catholicism never stuck with me. I’ve already been topped off with enough guilt throughout my life, and I’m not sure I could handle much more.
The anxiety-skewing side of my brain seeks the safety that religion can bring, the relief that comes with all of this certainty. However, my intellectual, philosophical, and scientific side always seems to cut in and take over whenever I get too “woo-woo” about certain thoughts that I have (me: “I’d love to see my grandfather again.” Brain: “He stopped existing years ago.”).
But a large part of me tries to ignore that second voice and hold onto a belief, any belief, so that I can chase that feeling of having something explained by faith.
An example: déjà vu. The eerie feeling that you’ve already lived an exact scene of your life and that you are currently living it right now again. I have déjà vu all the time. Or rather, when I have it, I have it frequently, and then I sometimes go months or years without experiencing that sensation.
I love déjà vu. I freaking love that feeling. I always yell out “I’m having déjà vu!” when I’m in the middle of it. And it’s mainly because of the story that I’ve told myself about it. (I think my step-mom once told me a version of it, and it just stuck.) It’s one of those things that “I’d like to believe in” even though I don’t fully believe in it. But I so want to believe it!
The story I tell myself is this: Before your soul joined with your physical body, it created a plan for your life. Your soul laid out every decision that you would make, all the people that you would meet, all of the tiny moments that would make up a lifetime. Maybe your soul had done this many times, maybe this was only the second or third time your soul had planned out a life. Regardless, a map exists of how you are supposed to live your life.
And every time that you make a decision that lands you squarely on a point on that map, the feeling of déjà vu is your soul deep-down remembering that planning session it had. It’s a moment of clarity that allows you to say, “I’m on the right path.”
So reassuring 😭 I love it.
But then, when I’m having this great, feel-good moment of belief in my soul planning everything out on an infinite metaphysical whiteboard, Mr. Left Brain shows up and starts shaking his head and making that belittling “tsk tsk” sound.
Seriously? A soul brainstorming session? That’s what’s going to make you feel better about deciding on cookie dough ice cream instead of brownie batter ice cream on a Tuesday night in the grocery store? That wasn’t your soul, that was your stomach. He’s dubious, and his doubt takes all the fun out of it.
I imagine having faith in a religion is similar to what I think about déjà vu, but without Mr. Left Brain crashing the party. Or maybe he still shows up occasionally, but he isn’t as convincing.
I yearn to find a religion that doesn’t send my Mr. Left Brain chasing after every inconsistency, every doubt, every fear. But it hasn’t happened yet. And honestly, I don’t think it every will.
But. ← And that’s a big but.
But I think I’m starting to be okay with all of this.
Because the feeling that I’m really chasing is the feeling of being part of something bigger than myself.
And something that my religious upbringing did create within me is a deep belief that I am connected to everything.
I believe that I am connected to every human on this planet through the shared experience of being human. I believe that I am connected to every plant, every air molecule, every granule of dirt and sand because we are all made of stardust. And I believe, somehow, that I am connected to every star and planet and galaxy and black hole that has ever existed.
I don’t know how we all exist, but the fact that we do is something really special, and that feels more important to me than finding a single religion to believe in.
That last belief of being connected to everything in the universe manifests itself in an obsession with space and astrophysics. For as long as I can remember, the cosmos has utterly fascinated both sides of my brain and helped me understand both my individual importance and insignificance. This obsession includes thing like:
- How my favorite movie is Interstellar, and it moves me to tears every time I see it (that black hole/tesseract scene is brutally emotional).
- I started writing a fake gradate thesis on string theory during my junior year in college thinking I would go on to study it in grad school (oh how far I have strayed).
- I paid cold, hard cash to name a star after a word that my husband and I made up (unicorndog) so that I felt like I owned a part of the infinite and intangible universe.
- I know exactly where I was when I found out that the Higgs boson particle had finally been discovered.
- My dream job is working at NASA (I’d be stoked to be a janitor there). Also, one the gifts on my wedding registry was a behind-the-scenes trip to NASA. Lastly, I got “way too mad” at my husband when he got to see mission control in Houston without me.
One of the strongest pulls to space? An overwhelming sense of calmness and peace that overcomes me when I’m sitting in a planetarium, looking into the depths of our universe.
We’re back at planetariums! Thanks for trusting me to get here.
The first time I went to a planetarium was sometime in elementary school. I was one lucky space baby because I grew up in the suburbs of Chicago, which means that my first planetarium experience was at the Adler Planetarium — the first planetarium in the Western hemisphere. I always thought it was a totally rad place.
I hate how planetariums are portrayed in the movies because my experience was always magical. At some point, Hollywood decided that all planetariums were make-out spots for handsy high schoolers or a place to unrealistically smoke pots without the knowledge of any adult. Not really the case when you’re nine — my whole class was captivated, and I didn’t want to leave. I’m pretty sure I convinced my chaperone to let our group watch the galactic presentation twice instead of walking around the rest of the exhibits.
The technology that it takes to project a universe on a dome-shaped ceiling is almost as mind-blowing as the universe itself. I remember watching the projectors in the middle of the room as they someone seamlessly connected together to illustrate different constellations.
But the feeling that you get while watching the stars shift into entire colorful galaxies is a blissful mixture of giddiness and sea sickness. I loved how my neck would hurt after watching the show, and I always regretted where I sat because I thought another row would have a better view. (It was impossible to see every corner of the projected universe just as it is to see every corner of the actual universe — so meta.)
I’m grateful that I’ve been back to the Adler Planetarium a couple times in my life, and I’ve also been to the Albert Einstein planetarium inside the Smithsonian National Air and Space Museum in Washington, DC, as well as a couple smaller, local planetariums. But it seems like planetariums are a rare bird these days, so that’s why going to one had to be included on the list. And I knew that I wanted to visit a new this time around.
I chose the Morrison Planetarium in the California Academy of Sciences in San Francisco. It is the biggest all-digital planetarium in the world and boasts a 75-foot dome. I also invited some equally nerdy and awesome friends along to truly get the whole experience.
The Cal Academy is first of all such a cool (if not overpriced) museum. The planetarium is a huge sphere on one side of the building with a clear dome mirroring it on the other side filled with a recreated rainforest ecosystem. Truly great design for a museum — I was thoroughly impressed.
When it was our time to entire the planetarium, we walked all the way around the base of it to get a feel for its grandeur. When we entered it, I realized that it looked a bit like an IMAX theater. All of the seats were on one side facing the screen that reached up above us and only a little bit behind us. Not really the image of what I had built up in my head from my younger memories. But, I was still excited to see what this place had in store.
When the presentation started… it was a literal IMAX theater. The “movie” was about life on Earth! There were dizzying sequences of flying over prehistoric landscapes and lots of mentions of “teasing the color spectrum” by the guy who voices Thomas Jefferson in Hamilton (which I have never seen before — please don’t hurt me).
But there wasn’t any space.
Hmm.
I gave it a couple more minutes, but the most “spacey” it got was some shots of Earth from space. At this point, I was a little upset. And, being a typical Millennial in the time of COVID, I was also very tired. I felt myself nodding off about 5 minutes in and stubbornly allowed myself the luxury of sleep. If this wasn’t going to show me space then I didn’t want to be awake!
I went in and out of light sleep and deep sleep, only hearing a little bit of the presentation on how there had once been life on Mars and how there might be other planets that could sustain life as well. I woke up near the end when the narrator was bringing it all back together, about just how special Earth is to house the diversity of life.
And I had a moment of clarity.
Perhaps the feeling of smallness that I feel when I think about the enormity of space makes me think that I’m a part of something bigger. But the connections that I have made with the people on this special planet give me the clarity in my existence that I deeply desire.
My family gave me my existence and a strong blueprint for living this precious life. My friendships teach me how to balance putting myself first while also listening and loving with empathy and a full heart. My relationship with my husband is a unique rollercoaster of ups and downs that accompany the incomparable vulnerability of sharing the depths of your soul with someone else.
I feel most alive when I am connected to people, not to some theoretical ideal or single religion.
Huh. I guess planetariums really are super rad.
