Group photo of participants at the AAVSO Spring Meeting, from the Facebook page. Adrian and I arrived a little too late to get in on the photo session, unfortunately!
If I find out that another AAVSO meeting will be taking place at a location within easy traveling distance, and if I have the time, I'm going to be there throughout the event from start to finish. Even though it was thrilling to be at the banquet, it was a little disappointing at the same time. Most of the other participants had been able to renew acquaintances or get to know each other from Thursday through Saturday. We were arriving right at the tail end of everything. I didn't have a lot of time to introduce myself or talk to many other people. Plus, I think most of them were eager to get back to their hotels and/or get back home. The banquet didn't last very long.
When we first walked in, the first person I ended up talking to was Mike Simonsen of Imlay City, Michigan. I knew this because of the name tag hanging around his neck. Mike wasn't aware of this, but he was familiar to me. He often posted information about observing on the AAVSO website and I'd also read his posts on his own site. He is a prolific observer who has the awesome ability (to me) of making thousands of variable star estimates per year from the not-so-pristine skies of Michigan, sometimes in frigid weather. Although he seems most involved with cataclysmic variables, he's also written posts to encourage visual observers, and I also know that he's been active with the Charts and Sequences group. Mike was at the raffle table selling tickets to about ten prizes, from eyepieces to color imagers to books. When I asked him who to see about getting a name tag, explaining that we'd just arrived, he pointed us in the direction of Rebecca Turner (who I'd corresponded with through email prior to registering for the meeting).
Rebecca Turner was, therefore, the second person we met in person. As soon as I introduced myself and Adrian, she went to work. She not only obtained name tags for us, but she also handed us cards to let the servers know we'd signed up for the braised ribs main course. Rebecca was a tall, younger woman who seemed to radiate enthusiasm and energy.
Adrian and I went back to the raffle table and bought eleven tickets from Mike, and I put most of them in the boxes for the solar system color imager and the video imager that were being offered. Then we sat down at one of the big empty round tables in the room to take in everything that was going on. Most of the others were milling around and talking in small groups by the cash bar near the back of the room, then started drifting to the other tables.
Two men asked if the seats to our right were taken and had a seat with us. The one closest to me introduced himself as Richard Glassner, from Jefferson City, Missouri. He was a recent retiree who had worked in the nuclear industry, and had just recently joined the AAVSO. He told me that he was starting out as a visual observer and used binoculars; he hadn't bought a telescope yet. I agreed with him that for learning the night sky and getting started in variable star observing, binoculars were the way to go. The other man was quiet and reserved, and introduced himself as Tom Bretl from Plymouth, Minnesota. The name was familiar to me, but I didn't realize until I returned home and checked that Tom was the Charts and Sequences Section Leader. Others sat down to our left; next to Adrian was Marco Ciocca from Richmond, Kentucky. He spent much of the meal chatting with a man to his left (who's name I never caught) about CCD observing; a technical discussion that was really out of my expertise. Marco did show us an image of the galaxy M101 that he'd taken once, on the screen of his cell phone.
(Just as a side note, while we were sitting there making small talk, word got out and spread around the room that at Belmont, American Pharaoh had won the race and become the first horse in 37 years to win the Triple Crown!)
Also, while we were waiting for the meal to begin, Stella Kafka started to walk around the banquet room from table to table, determined to talk to every participant even if they had spoken before. Stella had just become the new AAVSO Director earlier this year, taking the reigns from Arne Henden (who was sitting with his wife at a nearby table; I never had the chance to break in and talk to him). Stella seemed very personable. She asked me how long I'd been in the organization and whether I observed visually or otherwise. She said that she was just a beginner at actual variable star observing herself, but she was eager to get started, and pleased to lead the organization. She seemed outgoing, genuinely grateful to meet the observers, and energetic. I think she'll make a fine Director.
After the meal was over, Rebecca Turner led everyone through a trivia contest where each table was a team, and we wrote our answers to the questions on paper. Unfortunately for me, the questions were over the papers that had been presented over the last few days, and I was clueless. Marco seemed to know all the answers. Then the raffle was held, with Mike Simonsen taking over at the microphone as Master of Ceremonies. His enthusiasm and sense of humor really showed through during this event. Richard, at our table, had bought a real pile of raffle tickets. He ended up winning four of the ten prizes!
After Rebecca had tallied up the answers from the trivia game and announced the winning table, Stella went to the microphone to thank us all for coming, and to encourage all to keep observing and sending in star estimates to Headquarters.
Then the banquet started breaking up, though it wasn't even 9:00 PM and still light outside. It seemed like I'd gone to the bar to get a beer and turned around to find a half-empty room. I would have liked to have talked to the eight or so observers from Indiana who were on the attendee list, but I never even found out where they were in the room. I'd spotted Barbara Harris at another table; a Council Member who'd caused a stir in the amateur astronomy community in 2010 when she'd detected the recurrent nova U Scorpii in outburst in predawn skies. However, I never had the chance to meet her in person. I had some last talks with Richard and Tom, finished my beer, and then Adrian and I decided to head back to Indianapolis.
Out in the parking lot, we ran into Mike Simonsen one last time and talked with him just a little more, then had one last drive through the Ball State campus before heading back down I-69 to Indianapolis.
Even though the meeting was brief for me, I'd have to write that it gave me more inspiration than I'd had before to make variable star observing a priority. I'd wavered a lot over the last few years about whether to stay with it, or put more time into other projects like meteor observing or lunar work. But even this short exposure to other members and staff gave my enthusiasm a boost. I still think there are important niches that a visual observer can fill, and valuable data to be gathered at the eyepiece.
No comments:
Post a Comment