Subcultures

I used to be an amateur astronomer. We're an odd bunch of people, nervously glancing at the sky as the evening approaches, muttering imprecations at clouds and obsessively checking the meteorological sites to see if there will be clear skies for the night. We'd rush home, pack our beloved telescopes and kit into our cars and brave the last bit of rush hour traffic for remote sites far away from the annoying city lights and its photonic pollution. When we arrived on the site, we'd set up our equipment, dig out our dinners and dined on food even as the mosquitoes dined on us. Those of us who are early birds will chit-chat about our recent observations or equipment, still glancing up every now and then to pray that the clouds stay away. Then, someone will quietly comment, "Yep, there's Sirius up there" and we'd all slowly scatter to our own stations to calibrate our now-cooled scopes. We're a solitary bunch, we brothers and sisters of sky science. As night falls, conversations stop or at least tone down to a near-inaudible mutter. There is the sky and there is you; we are all intimately aware and in awe of the fact that photons that have traveled billions of years over unimaginable distances will end their journey upon our retinas that night. We, all of us, are mesmerized by the terrible beauty that is our universe. Slowly, ever so slowly, one by one will quietly pack up and leave the area, making sure that no white light leaks anywhere to spoil the night vision of those remaining behind. Eventually, the last one packs up too and the night's session is over.

Our lives are intersections of the many subcultures that we belong to. Our workplace has a culture. Our families have our own cultural norms. Our hobbies have their own subculture. Each with its own rules, with its own rituals (whether we are conscious of them as ritual or not) and its own challenges and rewards. How many subcultures do you belong to? I suspect you may be somewhat surprised if you started counting...