So for two days running, from 4 to 5 PM on a Monday and Tuesday, I taught astro-physics to two groups of Junior Rangers in an old barn. Using somebody's old discarded Sears slide projector, showing selected slides a guy in Arizona sold me from the 70s. Pointing at homemade exhibits that included a sun model made out of metal tractor wheel on an electric fan stand, a galaxy painted on a gas company wooden spool top, a walmart umbrella with an earth globe stuck on the handle, and some homemade pyramids. I had just built my fourth planetarium theater out back, but I couldnt use it. So this is what resulted. And it was good.
There were philisophical questions. A nature group like this being shown hydrogen fusion? Don't they just want to know where the North Star is for night hikes? They left it up to me - this was reputed to be a planetarium, but nobody knew what that really WAS, so it could be anything I decided it was to show them. That kind of blank canvass can be daunting, requiring really some self examination. OK, they want to see what YOU want them to see. What you can offer. There are two ways to look at that really. The first is, with no expectations and no admission fee, well, they get what they pay for. I could turn on a TV with an hour video tape of Carl Sagan and they probably wouldnt mind. It was just a field trip. I could stand before them and just talk from memory. I could dream up a workshop - connect the dot star maps. Anything. Once I realized that, it both removed any pressure I might have felt from the situation, but made me realized I was being given the chance to convey MY passion. What drove ME. What made ME do the things I have done, remember the things I have remembered, dream the things I have dreamed.
And its like that when you build a planetarium. People coming to you are blank slates expectation wise. These are people who've seen every possible special effect in the movies, on their computer screens - theres no passion there anymore. The passion has to come from within the presenter. With the material that drives the presenter.
And so - here was my opportunity - I had more passions than just pointing out constellations. I LOVE that .. its why I was here. But this .. THIS .. was a chance to do a little more ....
TO BE CONTINUED
There were philisophical questions. A nature group like this being shown hydrogen fusion? Don't they just want to know where the North Star is for night hikes? They left it up to me - this was reputed to be a planetarium, but nobody knew what that really WAS, so it could be anything I decided it was to show them. That kind of blank canvass can be daunting, requiring really some self examination. OK, they want to see what YOU want them to see. What you can offer. There are two ways to look at that really. The first is, with no expectations and no admission fee, well, they get what they pay for. I could turn on a TV with an hour video tape of Carl Sagan and they probably wouldnt mind. It was just a field trip. I could stand before them and just talk from memory. I could dream up a workshop - connect the dot star maps. Anything. Once I realized that, it both removed any pressure I might have felt from the situation, but made me realized I was being given the chance to convey MY passion. What drove ME. What made ME do the things I have done, remember the things I have remembered, dream the things I have dreamed.
And its like that when you build a planetarium. People coming to you are blank slates expectation wise. These are people who've seen every possible special effect in the movies, on their computer screens - theres no passion there anymore. The passion has to come from within the presenter. With the material that drives the presenter.
And so - here was my opportunity - I had more passions than just pointing out constellations. I LOVE that .. its why I was here. But this .. THIS .. was a chance to do a little more ....
TO BE CONTINUED
