Observing Doubles

This past Saturday night I spent almost all my scope time observing double
(or multiple) star systems. I noticed when I was packing up that I was in a
very peaceful mood, similar to what I get after meditating.

Thinking back to my last previous double star session, I remember I was also
in a unusually pleasant mood afterwards. There must be something about the
simple sight of two or three stars burning close to each other in the sky
that evokes peace and tranquility in me. There is an almost Zen-like
simplicity in the arrangement that moves me in special ways. I don't get this
with other more complex celestial objects even though I enjoy them as well.

I think a lot more double observing is in my future.

Thinking back to my last previous double star session, I remember I was
also
in a unusually pleasant mood afterwards. There must be something about
the
simple sight of two or three stars burning close to each other in the sky
that evokes peace and tranquility in me. There is an almost Zen-like
simplicity in the arrangement that moves me in special ways. I don't get
this
with other more complex celestial objects even though I enjoy them as
well.

I think a lot more double observing is in my future.


I get that just looking up into a Mag 5 or 6 sky. A telescope view just
adds
to the mystery. It is neat picking out things that are not visible unaided.
Like M51 for instance. This dull eye-like structure that is just there.

Correction ...M57 rather.

Thinking back to my last previous double star session, I remember I was also
in a unusually pleasant mood afterwards. There must be something about the
simple sight of two or three stars burning close to each other in the sky
that evokes peace and tranquility in me. There is an almost Zen-like
simplicity in the arrangement that moves me in special ways. I don't get this
with other more complex celestial objects even though I enjoy them as well.

I'm with you on this, to the point that I printed out the entire
Struve catalog and take it with me on every session. Doubles are just
plain fun, to track down, to split the closer ones, to observe the
color contrasts, etc. Just this past weekend with my 14.5" Newt I
discovered Struve 3182, a beautiful triple at RA 18h 22.2' and
declination -15° 5', close to M16. The split is initially quite wide
at 64x and the pair consists of blue and orange components of nearly
equal brightness. In the Struve catalog, only those components are
listed. But the Millennium Star Atlas showed a closer companion.
Sure enough, at 193x, the blue component split nicely into a close
equal-brightness binary!

Cheers,
Ritesh

There must be something about the
simple sight of two or three stars burning close to each other in the sky
that evokes peace and tranquility in me.

I feel the same.


john