I never expected to destress from double-postponing my wedding by staring into space, yet there I was, spying on the heavens from my backyard in light-polluted Cleveland for the umpteenth night in a row.
“That one’s Jupiter,” I whispered to my dog, Harry, who’d come to expect this backyard astronomy ritual. We were months into the pandemic and my now-husband, Frank, and I had spent the evening finalizing an email to alert friends and family that, yet again, we’d delayed our wedding due to spiking COVID-19 transmissions. Pairing this stress with the questionable status of my career—how can I be a travel writer without, well, traveling?—plus Frank’s front-line emergency physician job had my stomach in neverending knots. But the tension slackened each night as I sprawled beneath the stars, letting my mind recall those old Astronomy 101 lessons from college—particularly the vastness of the universe, and just how tiny my problems felt within it.
While life has returned to normal, I still turn to the cosmos for stress relief today—and I’m not the only one. Mindful stargazing, an activity that harnesses…
