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It was just a 4-minute video, but it taught us a lot. Nothing about the subject of the video, but a lot about Dan and me.

When our 38th wedding anniversary rolled around we decided to celebrate in NYC to take in a couple of shows and visit the planetarium. The planetarium was my suggestion which you will doubt the truth of if you know me. If you don’t know me you certainly will doubt it by the end of this, but I really am fascinated by space, planets, and black holes.

At the planetarium we stepped in line for a four-minute video about black holes. I was excited. I have a black hole, more commonly known as a purse. I hoped the video would answer that age-old question ‘Where do the chapped lip balms go after I drop them into my handbag?’

We were directed to stand by a metal railing that encircled a concave floor in front of us, and to watch the floor. This is where the video could be seen.

As the lights lowered, I hurried down the first of the many bunny trails that track up my mind. Why the floor, I wondered, why not the ceiling, the walls, and why were they too cheap to provide chairs? But just before the lights completely dimmed, I spotted it. Right in the center of this floor that would soon to be filled with images of black holes.

 A chapped lip balm.

Just a tiny little thing really, but it sent me deeper down the bunny trail. Did the curators purposefully put the lip balm on the floor of the soon to be black hole? Someone had a subtle sense of humor. Or perhaps someone thought they were putting it into the black hole they carry around on their shoulder and it slipped out and rolled down into the wrong black abyss.

I began to wonder if the owner had begun searching in their bag for the elusive balm, and because it was a cold and windy day in NYC I worried about the person’s dried, cracking lips. Logically I began to think about the cautionary tales of people who used the balms and unwittingly addicted their lips to the waxy, greasy coating.

I began to think how I would have reacted. Swift to jump into action, I imagined myself catapulting over the railing and sliding down the concave screen to retrieve the treasure even though I probably had 6 more of them in my bag. I imagined the horrified shout from the security person dressed to look like a curator, and my scream I when I realized my foot had rammed right through the video screen, yet I had the chap balm in my hand, so, mission accomplished as they say in space science. Do they say that in space science? Yet another bunny trail.

Then mercifully the lights came up, and we were directed to leave the room quickly before allowing our eyes to adjust to the light.

Dan and I had so much to talk about after the video as we headed to the next exhibit. He spoke about the things he hadn’t considered about black holes. “If black holes distort time and space around them, this helps explain the possibilities of time travel, he said thoughtfully.”

He focused then on supermassive black holes, and primordial holes, remarked about the 100 billion galaxies out there, that each have 100 million black holes, and how they regularly devour things. This habit of devouring things I had already known about. I carry a purse after all.

Finally, he realized I hadn’t said a thing.

“What did you get from the video? Only four minutes and it was full of food for thought, wasn’t it?”  he asked.

“Did you see the chapped lip balm at the center of the screen?” I asked.

He looked at me in disbelief, shook his head, and quietly took my hand as we walked.

“Let’s see what else we can find out today,” he said.

I had moved on too, because I started to think about the time that I found 7 pens in my purse.