Inessa Patrikeyeva, student of 9 "A" class of the municipal educational institution "Secondary School No. 38" of the city of Saransk, Republic of Mordovia.
"Shooting star"
I love looking at the stars on a clear warm summer evening. And then one day I was sitting on the balcony of our two-story house in the village. Spreading dwarf apple trees grew right under the balcony, which my grandfather had planted. Suddenly, out of nowhere, somewhere near me there was a plaintive meow ... Kitten ??? Here? In the house opposite, there lived an evil dog named Ralph, who just couldn’t stand cats, and therefore neither we nor our neighbors could even think about getting a kitten. I went to the railing of the balcony and tried to look out in the dark where the sound was coming from. At that moment I saw... shooting star, looked at it and .... flew after her. The shooting star disappeared behind the roofs of neighboring trees, and I ended up ... on a tree. Probably, I strongly leaned over the railing and fell down, but when I fell, I caught my clothes on the branches of my grandfather's apple tree and hung on it! How scared I was then! Alone, on a tree, late at night, and not a soul around!
I thought I had sat there all my life, even though it had only been an hour.
To my great joy, my best friend, Kostya, passed by.
Kostya…. I called him.
Who is it? - he slowly approached the tree on which I was hanging.
Kostya, it's me, Alice. Take me out of here, please.
He raised his head and saw me. He chuckled and leaned towards me. When he caught up with me, he grabbed me by the waist and lowered me to the ground.
Thank you, I said and kissed him.
My pleasure. Shooting star?
Yes, she took me with her into this dark abyss... Thank you again. I don't know what I would do without you.
Please. Goodnight.
And he left. A luminous streak reappeared in the sky, another shooting star rushed into the night distance. Me and “my star” followed Kostya with their eyes for a long time. And then…. I woke up. I dozed off, sitting in a cozy rocking chair with my favorite book on my lap.
It's a pity that it was just a dream, I thought, and, turning off the lamp, went into the room, lay down on my soft bed and fell asleep again.
Many legends, omens and superstitions have been created about stars and shooting stars. And a lot of romantic poems and songs were created by people singing about the stars, and inevitably about love. Here is one of the possible fantastic legends (and below is the song):
…When the Almighty created the Universe, the Lord first created the stars and breathed Love into them. And, having made the stars chosen, God put the mission of the luminaries - to radiate Love. And Love flew into the boundless space, inhabiting the born planets and the arisen Life. But while the stars selflessly and disinterestedly gave the energy of Love, and in return did not respond until the reciprocal Love from Life, the stars began to burn dimmer ... dimmer ...
Then the Lord created Man, and Love entered into their hearts, accepting Love and radiating Love to all - Beloved, other people, smaller brothers, the Planet, the Stars and the Almighty ... And when the first people on Earth, the first lovers pulled out such a powerful energy of Love from their hearts, that flew to the stars and satiated the luminaries with the languor of love ... And already fading galaxies flared up! And from the love of couples of luminaries in love, myriads of small stars were born, not luminous and not burning, but absorbing the energy of the stars of Love - meteors, comets ... And the restless meteor stars scattered, settling in space and protecting planets from collision, like parents - big luminaries, and like educators - Angels ... So they would have reigned in the boundless space and time of the Universe - Love and harmony, conquering darkness and chaos, but then ... And then the descendants of Eve and Adam began to multiply and multiply, loving and beloved, but not all - and those who failed to open the hearts of Love, but filled them with Soullessness. The Energy of Soullessness crawled out to the light, and in a terrible battle it began to win, devouring the energies of Love... The cosmic ocean began to dry up again - the ocean of radiation of human Love for the luminaries...
And then... the suffering Stars and angels began to make terrible sacrifices - to send small star-meteors to the Earth, burning up in the atmosphere. And when burning, give particles of the souls of the Stars to people, transfer love from them - Falling Stars. For each of the Falling Stars, the angels predestinate their "star" destinies - one to move into the soul of love of a newborn child, the other part of the energy of Love - to all people. Another purpose of fate is to transfer part of the energy to the soul of a deceased person, leaving his body and flying to Purgatory. But, each person with a Shooting Star in the sky (regardless of whether he managed to make a wish or not), a part of the Love of the stars is intended to be absorbed and transferred to the rest of the Universe ... And yet ... there are, alas, quite unexpected intrusions into life - cosmic catastrophes: if at some point the energy of Love suddenly became insufficient to help the Stars and Angels ... then a meteorite that did not burn up in the atmosphere brings potential troubles on Earth (Tunguska meteorite, Chelyabinsk meteorite and others). Thank God that although meteorites often fall on the Earth, they do not bring big troubles ...
Here, so to speak, is an unscientific new legend, but I so want people to understand: without Love, the world will die ... Keep love! May it be so!
FALLING STARS
In the darkness - a traced beam, illuminating the forest and the sky ...
In the illumination of the soul, Eternity froze in an instant ...
Breaking the firmament, the brilliance and flash of magic,
Extinguishing wand of sparks... a dark forest, but a cliff...
The forest along the edge - into a cliff ... somersault ... numb,
From a fallen star, from heaven a vocalization:
“Love is God, and the covenant (soaring up the soul):
As love leaves - the stars fall down ... "
CHORUS:
Well, if suddenly trouble is very painful and bitter,
And the star burns down, breaks love...
Guess the secret, prophesy with a scarlet dawn,
So that love, returned ... flared up again ...
CHORUS:
And the stars will fall in the starfall of the night,
Shine on, my star, love that prophesied ...
Let the angels save love, and do not burn
The stars flying towards the Earth return again...
…………………..
Let love not burn...
If you look up on a clear, cloudless night, then you will see a magnificent picture of the starry sky. Thousands of flickering multi-colored lights add up to bizarre figures, captivating the eye. In ancient times, people believed that it was lanterns burning, fixed on a crystal vault of heaven. Today we all know that these are not flashlights, but stars. What are stars? Why do they shine and how far are they from us? How are stars born and how long do they live? About this and much more - our story.
To understand what a star is, just look at our Sun. Yes, our Sun is a star! But how is it? - you ask. - After all, the Sun is big and hot, and the stars are so small and do not warm at all. The whole secret is in the distance. The sun is practically "nearby" - only some 150 million kilometers, and the stars are so far away that scientists do not even use the concept of "kilometers" to measure the distance to stars. They came up with a special unit of measurement called the "light year". We will talk about the light year a little later, but for now ...
Why are the stars colored? Hot and cold stars
The stars that we observe vary both in color and brightness. The brightness of a star depends on both its mass and its distance. And the color of the glow depends on the temperature on its surface. The coldest stars are red. And the hottest ones are a bluish tint. White and blue stars are the hottest, their temperature is higher than the temperature of the Sun. Our star the Sun belongs to the class of yellow stars.
How many stars are in the sky?
It is practically impossible to calculate even at least approximately the number of stars in the part of the Universe known to us. Scientists can only say that in our Galaxy, which is called " Milky Way", maybe about 150 billion stars. But there are other galaxies too! But much more precisely, people know the number of stars that can be seen from the surface of the Earth with the naked eye. There are about 4.5 thousand such stars.
How are stars born?
If the stars are lit, does anyone need it? In the boundless outer space there are always molecules of the simplest substance in the Universe - hydrogen. Somewhere there is less hydrogen, somewhere more. Under the action of forces of mutual attraction, hydrogen molecules are attracted to each other. These processes of attraction can last for a very long time - millions and even billions of years. But sooner or later, hydrogen molecules are attracted so close to each other that a gas cloud is formed. With further attraction, the temperature in the center of such a cloud begins to rise. Millions of years will pass, and the temperature in the gas cloud can rise so much that a thermonuclear fusion reaction will begin - hydrogen will begin to turn into helium and appear in the sky new star. Any star is a hot ball of gas.
The lifespan of stars varies greatly. Scientists have found that the greater the mass of a newborn star, the shorter its lifespan. The lifetime of a star can range from hundreds of millions of years to billions of years.
Light year
A light year is the distance that a ray of light travels in a year at a speed of 300,000 kilometers per second. And there are 31536000 seconds in a year! So, from the star closest to us called Proxima Centauri, a beam of light flies for more than four years (4.22 light years)! This star is 270 thousand times farther from us than the Sun. And the rest of the stars are much further away - tens, hundreds, thousands and even millions of light years from us. This is why stars appear so small to us. And even in the most powerful telescope, unlike the planets, they are always visible as points.
What is a "constellation"?
Since ancient times, people have looked at the stars and seen in bizarre figures that form groups bright stars, images of animals and mythical heroes. Such figures in the sky began to be called constellations. And, although in the sky the stars included by people in a particular constellation are visually next to each other, in outer space these stars can be at a considerable distance from each other. The most famous constellations are Ursa Major and Ursa Minor. The fact is that in the constellation Ursa Minor includes the North Star, which points to the north pole of our planet Earth. And knowing how to find the North Star in the sky, any traveler and navigator will be able to determine where the north is and navigate the terrain.
supernovae
Some stars at the end of their lives suddenly begin to glow thousands and millions of times brighter than usual, and throw huge masses of matter into the surrounding space. It is customary to say that there is an explosion supernova. The glow of a supernova gradually fades, and in the end, only a luminous cloud remains in the place of such a star. A similar supernova explosion was observed by ancient astronomers of the Near and Far East July 4, 1054. The decay of this supernova lasted 21 months. Now in the place of this star is the Crab Nebula, known to many astronomy lovers.
The birth, life and decay of stars is studied by the science of astronomy. Love astronomy, study it - and your life will be filled with new meaning!
One summer, my cousin Masha and I were vacationing with my grandmother in the countryside. My grandmother kept goats, her pension was not big and she sold goat's milk, they say it is very healthy. This is probably why I was the only one in the class who never missed a single lesson due to illness, because I grew up on goat's milk and healthy as a bull. The goats lived in her barn next to a large hayloft in which hay was stored. When my grandmother milked the goats, Makha and I loved to lie on the hay and look at the sky, looking at the snow-white clouds.
There, look, the dog is swimming, - said the cousin, pointing to a large cloud.
What a dog, what a horse! I objected.
Yes, you are not looking there, take it to the left. And over there, look, a dolphin, - Masha pointed in the other direction.
And it seems to me that this is a whale, look, it seems like a fountain is splashing out of its back.
Grandmother at that time finished milking the goat and asked:
Who wants steam milk?
I, I, we raised our hands together.
Grandma, can we stay here in the hayloft tonight? I asked hopefully.
Are you not afraid? Grandma was surprised.
And who am I afraid of here, goats or what?
I want to be with you too, - Masha asked.
In the evening, my grandmother gave us a blanket, pillows and a blanket. We laid everything on hay and lay down in dry grass.
The moon shone in the sky and thousands of bright stars sparkled. The sky was starry, I did not see so many of them in the city. We quickly found the constellation Ursa Major and could not find Ursa Minor in any way, and then we began to invent our own constellations and give them funny names. It was quiet in the village at night, no cars or people could be heard, only goats rustled and champed.
Look, Misha, the star is falling, - said Masha, pointing her finger at the sky. - Mom says, when you see a shooting star, you need to make a wish, and it will definitely come true.
I will wish that space aliens come to us, - I said. “I want to get to know them and convey a message with them to other planets.
Have you already written a message? Masha was surprised.
Not yet. But they will not arrive now, I still have time. Desires do not come true in one second. And what did you guess?
And I want my sister to appear, - Masha sighed dreamily.
We fell silent and each dreamed of his own, looking into the endless space.
Suddenly, rays of light ran along the walls and ceiling of the barn, they either disappeared or appeared and somehow strangely chaotically moved. Then a large beam appeared and directed its stream into the sky, then began to shine somewhere down, and then began to move towards us.
To say we were scared is an understatement. My heart skipped a beat with fear and my voice was gone. I wanted to say something to Masha, but I couldn’t, and Masha, apparently, was also dumbfounded by this horror. We clung to each other and watched the jumping beams with chilling horror. A million thoughts raced through my head in one second: “Is it really the aliens that flew in so quickly? What will happen to us now? Before I had time to make a wish, they were already there. No wonder dad says: be afraid of your desires - they tend to come true. But not so fast! The devil pulled this star to fall right now. Why couldn't I have come up with something better? Why did these aliens surrender to me? I wish I had a trip to Disneyland.”
Then we heard footsteps and we became even more afraid. We trembled with fear, clutched each other even tighter and closed our eyes in anticipation of the unknown. We felt someone or something approach and shine a light on us. We prepared for the worst.
Are you scared here? - we heard the familiar voice of my grandmother, who bent over us and shone a flashlight on us.
We want to go home!
Get us out of here!
We thought the aliens were after us!
We almost died of fear! - we interrupted each other, getting out of the hayloft.
Grandmother stood there and could not understand what had happened. We went into the house, and no longer had any desire to spend the night in the hayloft.