Once upon a time in the dark of the moon there was a little raccoon.  He lived down in a big warm chestnut tree with his mother who was also a raccoon.  – the opening line to the children’s book “Wait till the moon is full” by Margaret Wise Brown and illustrated by Garth Williams who is most famous for illustrating the Laura Ingalls books.   

“Wait till the moon is full” was a favorite of mine as a child and I think also of my mother and grandmother who read it to me – often! I can remember being in the car with my grandmother Ruth and seeing the moon – especially if it was a barely visible curve and saying the line from the book, the mother raccoon telling the little raccoon something like, “the moon is as thin as a sliver of a raccoon’s ear. Wait, Wait till the moon is full”.  I don’t remember how the other phases were described but I never see a sliver of a moon without hearing – in my grandmother’s voice – “thin as a sliver of a raccoon’s ear”.

You see, the little raccoon wanted to “go out in the night – to know an owl, to see if the moon is a rabbit, and to find out how dark is the dark.  But his mother said, “Wait, Wait till the moon is full.” So the little raccoon waited and wondered, while the moon got bigger and bigger and bigger.  Until at last, on a very special evening, the moon was full”. 

I don’t know if my fascination with being up and sometimes outside in the night is because of the book or if I loved the book because I loved the night.   My interest is not in seeing the moon or the stars up close or even knowing the constellations although I like seeing the very familiar ones: the big and little dipper, Orion’s cross, sometimes I can pick out Casseopia.  It is more like the night is a comforting presence – never the same – sometimes starless, sometimes so full of stars that it is nearly overwhelming to think of the vastness of the universe… to lie on the ground, in this dark, dark place with no artificial light to block the sky – on a clear night and see the Milky Way and the “billions and billions” of stars and know that the ones I can see are just a few of how many there are.  Well…that kind of makes the affairs of the day on planet earth seem just a bit inconsequential!

so…- what’s out there? is there an end somewhere or somewhen? and really, why are We – Here in this part of  wherever and whenever. Mysteries for another time of existence.

Tonight, the moon is full.