Earthbase

Each night, when I can, I wander out into the open space of Earth place Bakersfield/Oildale, a base somewhere between the long airstrips of coastal California, such as Edwards Air Force Base, where the civilian Space Shuttles (Endeavor, Columbia, etc.) once landed, and the central state spaceports, such as Shreiver Airbase in Colorado, and Sir Richard Branson's spaceport in New Mexico.

Here, in the south-central valley of California, with mountains on both sides, buildings lie close to the ground, and the night sky is a delight for someone like me, who dreams of his "girl from Neptune"—or is it, Jupiter?

When I was younger, a famous pop psychology book was written, entitled, Men Are from Mars, Women Are from Venus, purporting to explain the fundamental differences in thinking between men and women here on Planet Earth.

Most likely, if you look up at the sky in the Bakersfield night, you will see a huge cluster of stars resembling the Orion Constellation, featuring the recently-cooling famous star, Betelgeuse. Some might recall the romantic comedy Beatlejuice, perhaps with the same home star in mind. Contrary to reports, Betelgeuse did not die; it recently expanded and then contracted into a "brown dwarf," perhaps even with water, such our own Planet Earth.

If you stare into the night sky at the Orion Constellation long enough, it may appear to be moving in a circular (counter-clockwise?) direction, as though we are moving through the space-time continuum of our home, the Milky Way Galaxy, itself.

It takes light from our sun eight minutes to reach our Planet Earth, so when we look out at the stars in the evening, we are viewing events that have already occurred.

In the Orion Constellation, for example, when a star "dies," it falls into the Orion Nebula, where stars are reborn, including, presumably Betelgeuse.

And beyond Orion, in the Horsehead Nebula, is a place where Earth-like planets go to congregate and, presumably, retire.

The problem is, of course, will we lose our mother sun if we join our Earth like friends in the Horsehead Nebula?

You might consider reviewing the planetary diagrams of our solar system itself.

As the night wears on, in your dizzy stupor, you might begin to consider that the planet we know as Saturn resembles the entire space between our gaslight-enclosed sun, up to an asteroid belt just beyond Mars, where interstellar space probe Oamuamua actually resides.

You might once again wonder whether you can ever get to Neptune, but if Saturn is our sunspace, then perhaps Neptune is no one else than Venus.

And in the Earth art history, of course, the marble sculpture Venus de Milo represents no other than Aphrodite—or is it Cassiopeia/Cassidy?

Stuck somewhere in the legal age of purgatory, where Athena rules, replete with accusations of a sexual nature filling our newspapers, we are delayed from our spiritual eternal destiny simply on the basis of empty accusations, as described in the French language (once the language of diplomacy) as j'accuse [I accuse you].

So then, in the best humor we can muster, we consider whether our planetary father figure, Juno/Jupiter/Jove is no other than our Ice Planet from the great beyond—Pluto.

There are many threads of thought that might fill your mind as you look up into the Bakersfield night sky.

Then, you might consider if you really want to venture out into the great beyond of the space program, or instead, invite your interplanetary friends to come to visit you in person on the Earth base Bakersfield.

I personally pledge, sometimes joyfully, to remain here on Planet Earth and hitch a ride with our friend Oamuamua and, hopefully, our mother sun, if we ever need to retire to the horse head constellation.

Currently, we are completing our 2,650 year stay in the vicinity of the Pisces Constellation, and entering the long-awaited Age of Aquarius.

We complete our journey through the 12 astrological constellations in another 12,000 years, when again we are expected to return to the place that we were, in the northern night sky, at the beginning of our current written Earth age: the Constellation Aries.

So, we can say, we are halfway back to the beginning.

Similarly, as we consider our melting polar ice caps and related problems, we can estimate that we are approximately halfway through a 1,000 year mini ice age. The exact midpoint of this mini ice age was, likely, the year 2012, according to some South American Pyramidal Culture calendars.

The author of this article tends to agree with some astronomers: That the melting of the ice caps will conclude in the year 2597, at which time we anticipate that Planet Earth will be in the Age of Aquarius, or water.

Future segments in this series will discuss survival issues during this transition, and the evolutionary transformation of humankind as conditions on the planet change (i.e. global warming).