Photo # 2 (Sept 2008)

Our needed renewal will come from within ourselves and it will be centered in the playful awareness that each of us is a living universe, that each one of us, however fitfully, is capable of rebirth and that each one of us embodies that same love-lighted stuff that fires the atoms and fuels the stars.

- Rolland Gammon

How can a round star make a square nebula? This conundrum comes to light when studying planetary nebulae like IC 4406. Evidence indicates that IC 4406 is likely a hollow cylinder, with its square appearance the result of our vantage point in viewing the cylinder from the side. Were IC 4406 viewed from the top, it would likely look similar to the Ring Nebula. This representative-color picture is a composite made by combining images taken by the Hubble Space Telescope in 2001 and 2002. Hot gas flows out the ends of the cylinder, while filaments of dark dust and molecular gas lace the bounding walls. The star primarily responsible for this interstellar sculpture can be found in the planetary nebula's center. In a few million years, the only thing left visible in IC 4406 will be a fading white dwarf star.

We are so much more than our physicl selves! If we but open our awareness to our oneness with the stars and the myriads of being around us, our lives are expanded and enriched immeasurably.

Moreover, we learn through opening in these ways that we are one with all life. If we harm any aspect of our planet we are harming ourselves.

- D.B.