eccentricity mustn’t be rewarded
we must keep our ordinary orbit
When I was a little boy, i was *obsessed* with outer-space, with stars and planets and solar-systems and galaxies, with supernovae and nebulae, with the rings of Saturn, the craters on the moon and Jupiter’s stormy red spot!
I had stars ‘n’ planets wallpaper in my bedroom, I had a “Return of the Jedi” doona cover and my little whirring “constellation finder” would project the southern night sky onto my ceiling each night, slowly rotating in sync with the galaxy, oddly named after a chocolate bar.
Did you know that the bottom star of the two ‘pointers’ which point to the Southern Cross.. Beta Centauri.. is actually *two* stars and that the naked eye can’t distinguish them and just fuses them into one? Or that one of the stars that make up the constellation Orion, or “the big saucepan” is actually a *nebula*? I did. I could see it through my telescope! On any night clear of cloud, I’d be out there in the backyard scouring the skies.. until the craving for warm Milo took me over!
I could not wait for 1986, and with it Halley’s Comet to come to Grafton!
I would drive my sisters crazy rattling off the names of the planets in order.. how i *loved* those planets: Mercury, Venus, Earth, Mars, Jupiter, Saturn, Uranus, Neptune annnnnd Pluto! The nine planets of the solar-system!
I knew that one day on Pluto was about 6.4 “earth days” and that one year on Pluto (the time it takes to orbit the sun once) was nearly 248 “earth years” .. imagine waiting that long for Christmas!!
When people asked me what i wanted to be when I grew up, I would give them an honest answer with a voice slightly tinged with the disappointment that they had failed to notice I was already quite grown up: “I would like to be an astronomer and in my spare time I would like to write music for the movies” ..
….. .. … ….. .. … ….. .. … ….. .. … ….. [years pass] ….. … .. ….. … .. ….. … .. ….. … .. …..
On August 24, 2006 the International Astronomical Union attended their General Annual Meeting in Prague. I, having decided to to study Modern History and not Physics in senior high school, was not amongst them.
Late that afternoon.. the afternoon of August 24, 2006 the International Astronomical Union announced to the world that Pluto was no longer to be counted amongst the planets of the solar system, that Pluto was no longer a planet at all, that Pluto was now a dwarf, number 134340.
I drifted into a state of defeated bewilderment as my inner child slipped under his ‘Return of the Jedi’ doona and refused to show his face.
What sort of people would un-discover a great discovery? How could they take that away from Clyde Tombaugh? From Percival Lowell who spent the last years of his life searching for the elusive ninth planet he knew *must* be out there beyond Neptune? From the Observatory named after him? From 1930?
Who did these people think they *were*?
They said that the other 8 planets all orbit the sun in a perfect ellipse on a perfectly flat plane.
They said that Pluto’s ellipse was far from perfect, that sometimes he pushes in front of Neptune. They said that Pluto’s orbit was too eccentric (they actually used that word). They said that Pluto’s orbit had an inclination of 17º. They said that this was unacceptable. They said that Pluto is not a planet anymore.
I began to taste what was happening here.. what this was truly about.. It began to dawn on me.. to seep into my consciousness.. that Pluto had not been demoted.. he had not been reclassified.. Pluto had been excommunicated.
I was filled with a combination of shame on behalf of these people and fear to live in their world.
I awoke oft in the night.
I trembled opening my letterbox.
I imagined receiving a letter from the International Anthropological Union which read:
“Dear Montmorensy,
At the recent Annual General Meeting of the International Anthropological Union the definition of ‘person’ was addressed and adjusted. Due to your level of eccentricity and a certain inclination you possess, we regret to inform you that you are no longer a person. Please cease any actions and terminate any relationships which may be defined as personal. Your myspace and facebook pages will be automatically deleted at the end of the month.
Kind regards,
the members of the IAU.”
….. … .. ….. … .. ….. … .. ….. … .. ….. … .. ….. … .. ….. … .. ….. … .. ….. … .. ….. … .. …..
and so.. the song..
‘Pluto’ takes place late on the evening of August 24, 2006. Parents watching the late night news have just been informed that Pluto is no longer a planet. Fathers must creep into their son’s bedrooms and rip the glow-in-the-dark Pluto stickers off the ceiling. Mothers must snip the Plutos off the solar-system mobiles. It must be done swiftly and with stealth. They must remove the little ex-planet from the lives and imaginations of their children. It will not be spoken of in the morning.
Universe
Galaxy
Milky Way
Solar System
Earth
Prague
August 24th, Two Thousand Six
In the bedrooms of little boys
Fathers stretching on boxes of toys
Feeling the ceiling
Tippy toes, daddy knows.
Fingernails peeling off what?
Rip!
Plutos!
There he glows, there he goes.
Poor Pluto!
Poor Pluto! Do you know you’re no planet anymore?
Mother with scissors creeps down the hall
Bothered she shivers to see him fall
Ball on a string
(A delicate thing)
Tippy toes, mummy knows.
Shhhhh! here she goes….
She snipped him off that solar system mobile
She suddenly missed him so while
Venus pushed Mercury into the Sun!
The rings of Saturn unravelled, undone!
Jupiter felt her weight needed that counter weight
And promptly plopped to the floor
Which left more or less everything dangling well..
Eccentrically, particularly Earth: Prague.
Mickey cried, Donald died,
Walt Disney turned in his grave…
Poor Pluto! Do you know you’re no planet anymore?
(Do you have a radio?)
Poor Pluto! Do you know you’re no planet anymore?
Eccentricity musn’t be rewarded
We must keep our ordinary orbit
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