SkyView

Metro-122515-Tech

My birthday is at the end of the year, which can be bittersweet. Most people don’t want to take the time away from their holiday whirlwind of crazy to deal with your birthday celebration. But I found that it can be a majorly good thing — I had gotten in the habit of throwing a huge party, which is a fun thing to do for everyone who comes home for the holidays.

This year, though, a huge party wasn’t going to happen, as I am still in baby-step mode after a recent bout with cancer.

While most would consider their 40th birthday a milestone, I guess you could say the cancer thing made this a major milestone times infinity. But I just didn’t have the energy inside me to really go all out, even though I really wanted to.

I compromised by doing an open-invite dinner, and, even better, a quick hop over to Kauai. I wanted to watch the sun come up on my actual birthday, which also is the winter solstice and the shortest day of the year. Because it’s so short, I wanted to savor every moment of it.

When the new moon came up in my star sign of Sagittarius a few weeks ago, I also wanted to be there to experience it first-hand — just in case it’s true what they say about being able to absorb the power of the sun’s energy when it first rises. Well, hey, I’m there to try, especially this year.

While it’s easy to Google the exact time the sun rises, it’s more difficult to know exactly where the sun is going to be, since Earth rotates and it’s not necessarily coming up in the same place at all times of the year; the same with the moon.

I have been playing around with the free SkyView app since those freak wind storms started happening when Venus, Mars and Jupiter aligned in October. I mean, this weather was powerful enough to uproot a 150-year-old tree at Queen’s Hospital the same week that tons of trees were blown over in Washington state where my sister lives. (I was starting to wonder if we have underestimated our purpose and impact here on Earth, and if perhaps Earth was taking her life back from us.)

I remembered I had the SkyView app more recently when I was looking for exactly where the sun would be rising on my birthday. I was able to see where it would be coming up on my 40th birthday from a beautiful vantage point on the north shore of Kauai and also see that Saturn, Venus, Mars, Jupiter and the sun all were in a beautiful alignment, starting from my star sign Sagittarius. Looking at this in the SkyView app was amazing!

Have I turned into one of those new-age people I was always scared of growing up in Washington state? Maybe. Or maybe my interests have just widened to include self-realization and a much deeper respect for Earth and sky.

Either way, my new birthday tradition will be to watch the sun come up to lengthen the shortest day of the year. A huge party has now moved to the maybe-if-I-feel-like-it tray.

CHRISTA WITTMIER IS “SUPERCW” ON ALL SOCIAL MEDIA. FIND HER ON SNAPCHAT, SOUNDCLOUD, TWITTER, VINE AND INSTAGRAM. BY NIGHT, SHE IS KNOWN AS DJ SUPERCW. BY DAY, SHE IS KNOWN AS SENIOR MARKETING DIRECTOR FOR YOUNG’S MARKET COMPANY OF HAWAII. HER NIGHTLIFE BLOG SUPERCITY RUNS EVERY WEDNESDAY ON HONOLULUPULSE.COM