Surely it's happened numerous times since.


When my oldest niece was born, Venus tipped the sliver of a waxing moon. Deeply moved by this beautiful sight, I declared that I'd refer to each additional occurrence of such a sight as being her "cosmic birthday". Strangely, though I've glanced at the waxing moon almost monthly in the not so few years since then, I've seen Venus tipping the moon as it did back then only one more time.

I have no doubt that, even if this is a rather rare occurrence, it happens with much greater frequency than I've been able to catch. Perhaps I've stepped outside a few minutes too late, maybe if I was a bit farther north, I'd have caught the sight. Such an event is also, I trust, predictable, so that in order to see it happen again it must be relatively easy to know where and when I should position myself.

If it's relatively easy to know when a celestial sight such as this has taken place, should I count those times as additional occurrences of my niece's cosmic birthday? The answer of course is no. These "birthdays" take place not only when Venus tips the waxing moon, but when I observe that tipping.



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