How well I remember August weeks at camp, gazing into the skies and watching for falling stars. These awe-inspiring moments often came while singing around a campfire and telling ghost stories.

As the night sky overtook a sunset's afterglow, dew would fall and our eyes would dart from the fire to the darkness above. Spotting the moon came first. Of course looking for the man's face in the round disk evoked squeals of delight. Then I'd turn my focus to the vast, dark sky. The more I stared, the more stars I saw.

Now I am not, nor never was, what you'd call an amateur astronomer. I just never seemed to have time to learn a lot about the heavens. However, I did learn something about three key features of the night sky: the Big Dipper, the Little Dipper, and the North Star. The Big Dipper was easily recognizable, looking just like a ladle or dipper. Curiosity led me to more basics about this formation. I found it to be part of the constellation Ursa Major or Great Bear - and called an "asterism." I also learned the names of stars in the Big Dipper: Dubhe, Merak, Phecda, Megrez, Alioth, Mizar, and Alkaid. (Great crossword puzzle words!).

I became captivated by folklore about the Big Dipper. In Britain it is called "The Plough." In North America it is identified as the Big Dipper. Slaves in America called it "The Drinking Gourd," derived from African roots. Runaway slaves would "follow the Drinking Gourd" to find freedom in the North. Although I never mastered the skill, I was told you can tell the time of night by the position of the Big Dipper, which rotates around the North Star every 24 hours.

I did learn to use the two stars that form the pouring edge of Big Dipper's bowl to find the North Star or Polaris. I discovered that no matter where I stood in my state that if I faced Polaris I was looking to the north. It has been said that the North Star is more accurate in marking north than a compass. No wonder sailors and explorers learned to identify the Big Dipper and the North Star.

One lesson led to another. I learned The Big Dipper was a helpful signpost to other constellations and stars including Ursa Minor or Little Bear, Cassiopeia, Great Square of Pegasus, Andromeda, Bootes, Spica, and Virgo. The two stars at the lower end of the cup point to the Little Dipper. I still can't always identify all these but am nevertheless fascinated that the constellations and stars were catalogued and classified so many years ago and have persisted as guideposts for centuries.

I have long liked the Native American tradition of using the Big Dipper as a qualifier of a young man's vision to determine if he could see well enough to qualify as a warrior. He was challenged to describe what he saw in the handle of the Big Dipper. If he could see a double star in the center of the handle, he passed the eyesight test; they knew he had vision sufficient for hunting food and defending his tribe. Wow, nature's own eye chart!

Through the years I have come to look for the Big Dipper each summer. I never cease to be overwhelmed with awe by the spectacle that other humans have seen through the centuries. Somehow it brings me comfort and sense of a continuity with all generations to know that I, too, am aligned with these wondrous night markers.