Perseid Party Blows the Roof Off

Among the myriad highlights of a Bigadore summer few are more eagerly anticipated or highly cherished than a mid-August astronomical event: the annual Perseid meteor shower. Given that Cape Breton’s climate will never rival that of the Atacama Desert, the Perseid event is frequently and unhappily accompanied by a hand-maiden: Disappointment. Sometimes – more often than we like – August 12 delivers rain, or clouds, or a too-bright moon. Dark sky is essential, and Bigadore can be relied upon to deliver that, but the meteor show also demands a clear, cloudless, moonless, windless night. Which is exactly what we got for this year’s show.

When the circumstance are just right we – Bob, Lynn & Louise, Jan and your faithful correspondent – hump tarp, blankets and camp pads up to the cabin roof ‘round about 9:30 in the evening and wait for the show to begin. Conditions were so perfect this time that we stayed on the pitch for three hours, long enough to see the night sky make a good portion of its counter-clockwise circuit around Polaris, the north star.

We counted 115 meteors during the drama, close to 40 an hour. Many burn so quickly you’d better not blink or you’ll miss the flash. But there are always glories: a flaming arrow blazing across the dark leaving a trail that elicits gasps from all assembled. Just so you know, the three shining stars this time were meteors #40, 87 and 108.

What causes the Perseid show? Well, every year on or about August 12 our little old planet races through the flight path of a long-ago comet. The earth’s atmosphere collides with small – very small – particles of dust left in the comet’s wake. You could hold thousands of these particles in the palm of your hand, but never mind, when the collision occurs the tiny bits burn briefly, brightly and sometimes spectacularly for anyone astute enough to be gathered with pals on the roof of a dark-sky summer cabin.

I asked the others to speculate how many other Boularderie Island roofs might be the scene of a gathering just like the one we reveled in. The twins guessed ours might be the only one of its kind. Can it be so? It wasn’t just meteors performing for our wandering gaze. We watched the international space station – recently and famously the domicile of Canadian astronaut Chris Hatfield – sail grandly past. And many other satellites too. During lulls in the meteor action we could contemplate the three stars of the ‘Summer Triangle’, one of which, Deneb, burns at a hard-to-imagine 300,000 times the power of our puny, ordinary little Sun.

Or we could look toward the constellation Cassiopeia and see with our very own dark-adapted eyes the smudge of light that is Andromeda. Astronomers have counted billions of galaxies in the cosmos. Among all the billions, Andromeda is our closest galactic neighbour. But how close is ‘close’? Consider this, by the time the light of the trillion stars of the next-door neighbour collides with your rods and cones, it has been on the march, traveling at the speed of light, for, oh, about 2.3 million years.

How grand a time was had by all? Over the moon would seriously understate the fun. So grand that a passerby could have seen me out again, in the wee-smalls last night, between 2 and 4, not just looking for Perseid stragglers, but trying to photograph them too. And wonder of wonders, I succeeded at it. Squint attentively enough at these images and you’ll see the telltale streak of a fragment of comet dust that may have flashed – who knows – for me and me alone in this darkened corner of Cape Breton. Makes a fella lucky as all hell.

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All Hail Citizen Allen!

Pal Cindy Allen became a Canadian this week. On a sunny day, at Fortress Louisbourg of all places, along with 32 other brand new Canadians. Jan and Bob and I were invited to join the party and we’re glad we did.

Various dignitaries were on hand and a good-sized passel of Cindy’s many friends. There were members of Parliament – two of them – as well as a council member from the regional municipality and sundry other VIPs. It was a grand affair presided over by George Springate, a Citizenship Judge who also happens to be a Member of the Order of Canada and who wears a ring attesting to the fact he is also a Grey Cup champion. A stentorian and commanding figure with a mighty voice, no one nodded off when Judge Springate orated.

It was observed that many of us take our citizenship for granted. I don’t have to think long or hard to conclude that’s mostly a fair claim, but I am not one of them. Among the things that make me a most prideful Canadian is this: our country is the most multi-ethnic one on the planet. I read the claim once in the Globe and Mail , accept it wholly and cite it as often as opportunity allows.

The Louisbourg ceremony provided further support for the boast: blue-eyed, pale-skinned people were in a distinct minority among the 32 folks swearing allegiance to Elizabeth, Queen of Canada. By their dress and skin colour the new Canadians made it evident that they come from widely scattered parts of the world.

As for Cindy, well, she is American-born, of Canadian and American parents, but she has Cape Breton roots and has lived for decades on the eastern side of the Canso Causeway. She has no need to be told who John A. Macdonald is. Citizen Allen is a fine musician and has gladdened the hearts of myriad music-lovers throughout the Island. All the new Canadians received warm applause when they were congratulated by Judge Springate but the decibel count went through the roof when it was Cindy’s turn to shake Judge Springate’s meaty paw.

Mind you, some things won’t change: though she’s now a certified Canuck Cindy has no intention of substituting one Bruce for another in her musical pantheon. Despite the musical charms of Bruce Cockburn, the Boss is still the Boss: Springsteen rules.

Is Bob Nagel Really Dorian Gray?

The legions of his friends, admirers and worshipers will rejoice to hear that ageless Bob Nagel continues to confound and bemuse the humourless sourpusses who insist that decrepitude and infirmity must come inevitably to us all. Facing his 84^th birthday on the near horizon, Robert continues to entertain and amuse whilst inveigling his way into the heart of everyone he ever meets.  He fells trees, rides bicycle, knows and sings every show tune that ever was. What is the man’s secret?

Some insist that Bob is the living embodiment of an Oscar Wilde novel: a perilous portrait hangs in his attic auguring that the chickens will one day come horribly home to roost. Folks of a less literary, more scientific bent argue that Bob flourishes for the simple reason that his vital organs are pickled in alcohol. They point to prima facie evidence: he never drinks water (fish pee in it, after all) but lives on sherry by day, wine by early evening and Grand Marnier after dark. Still others, all of them disgustingly irreverent souls, cite the use-it-or-lose-it principle of human preservation and assert outrageously that Bob is no more inclined than he was at 14 to kowtow to the dictate of his Presbyterian forbears, namely that onanism leads to blindness and early death.

Whatever the secret behind his ongoing defiance of Father Time, there can be no doubt that Bob seems to have mastered the art. Nephew Dennis came with Nancy for their annual sojourn with Bob on MacKenzie Hill. We all took the bikes for 30-km rides to Cape Dauphin, Kempt Head, Southside Boularderie. While the rest stick strictly to the business of pedalling, steering and gear-grinding, Bob works his way through the entire songlist from South Pacific and Carousel.

He is ramrod straight, charms all the women, loves his root and leafy vegetables, sleeps like a child (‘That’s what you go to bed for’), enjoys perfect regularity, and appears as far from needing a cane or a walker as Justin Bieber. Don’t you just hate a bastard like that?!