Twinkle, Twinkle

"I love that song," said Emil. "Do you know what it's called?"

"Twinkle, Twinkle, Little Star," Mariah replied. "Charlotte often plays it to warm up when she practices. It's one of the first things she learned."

Emil and Mariah were sitting on the windowsill in the workroom late in the afternoon when they heard Charlotte start practicing her violin.

They were quiet for a few minutes, listening.

"I thought stars were big," Emil said, as Charlotte started playing scales, going one step higher for each note. "I thought stars were like our sun, and our sun is much bigger than our earth, and that's very, very big. Why does the song say the stars are little?"

"It's a very old children's song," Mariah replied. "Before children learn that stars are really very big, they think they are little, because that's how they look when we see them."

"I know they look little because they are far away," Emil said. "I wonder why they twinkle."
"I wonder that, too," Mariah said. 

Both dolls were lost in thought for a few moments.

Then they sat up. "Let's ask Mandy!" they both exclaimed at once.

Emil and Mariah found Mandy in the living room. Jolena was reading a story out loud to Mandy, who was knitting.

Mandy looked up from her work."What's up?" she asked.

"We were upstairs, listening to Charlotte play 'Twinkle, Twinkle Little Star,'" Emil began, "and we started to wonder why stars twinkle."

"I would like to know that, too," Jolena said.

"Hmmmm. I may need to draw a picture," Mandy said as she moved her reading glasses to the top of her head.

"I left my notebook and pencil here," Mariah said. "You can use it," she offered, handing the notebook and pencil to Mandy.

The three younger dolls gathered around Mandy as she put her glasses back on her nose and drew a picture on the paper.

This is what she drew. (It wasn't easy, because her fingers don't move.)

"This is the earth," she said, pointing to what appeared to be part of a ball. "Here's the thick layer of air and stuff that covers the earth."

"That's the atmosphere (AT-mus-fear)," Mariah said. "I remember that from when you explained why we don't see the stars in the daytime."

"That's right, Mariah," Mandy agreed. "The stars are out here," Mandy went on, pointing to the area outside the atmosphere. "Their light has to go through our atmosphere for us to see it."

"The atmosphere is moving around all the time," Mandy continued. "Different parts of it are warmer or cooler, and there are other differences in it that bend the light one way or another and back again."

"Like looking through water that's moving in a stream or brook?" Mariah asked. "The moving water makes the rocks at the bottom look like they're wiggling."

"A lot like that," Mandy agreed, "only the water is thicker and there isn't as much of it, but that's the idea."
"So why don't the planets and the moon and the sun twinkle?" Emil asked.

"That's a very good question," Mandy said. "What do you know about the planets, the moon and the sun that might be different from the stars?" she asked.
The three younger dolls were quiet as they thought.

"The planets and the moon are like the earth" Jolena said. "They don't have light of their own. But the sun is like a ball of fire...but so are the stars."

"That's true," Mariah agreed, "The sun does have its own light, because it's a star, too. The planets that are close enough for us to see them get their light from the sun shining on them."

"I was just thinking," Emil said, "if there are planets too far away for us to see them, and the only star that doesn't twinkle is the sun, maybe the stars twinkle because they are far away."
"Very good, Emil," Mandy said. "Now you're on to something."

"But that's where I get lost," Emil sighed. "I don't see why that makes a difference."

"Because the stars are far away," Mandy explained, holding up her picture in Mariah's notebook again, "they look very tiny, like little dots. Very little of their light reaches us, so the little bit we see of it bends this way and that as it comes through the atmosphere."

"In the case of the planets, the moon and the sun," Mandy continued, "there is a lot more light light that reaches our eyes, and some of it bends one way as it goes through the atmosphere and some of it bends the other way. With all that bending back and forth, we don't see them twinkle."

All four dolls were quiet while each thought about that. Even Mandy, who knew all this already, had a lot to think about, because when you teach someone something, you learn new things yourself.

That's when they noticed Charlotte's violin music again.

"I'm glad I have my special glasses that help me see and hear," Emil said. "What is that she's playing now?"

They listened for a moment.

"That's a melody from 'The Moonlight Sonata (suh-NAH-tuh),'" Mandy said. "That music was written for the piano, but it's very nice on the violin, even though Charlotte is playing only one note at a time. 'The Moonlight Sonata' is one of my favorites."

They listened some more. Charlotte stopped to fix a mistake she had made, or maybe to turn a page. Then she started again.

"I wonder," Emil said, "why the moon goes around the earth instead of around the sun the way the earth does."

All three younger dolls looked at Mandy.

Mandy would have rolled her eyes, except that her eyes are glued into her head.

"It's getting dark," she said, "and Charlotte seems to be done playing. Let's go out and watch the stars twinkle."


Cast--
Mandy: Götz Happy Kidz Katie 2015
Jolena: Götz Happy Kidz Lena in Aspen
Charlotte: Götz Happy Kidz Anna in Paris
Mariah: Götz Happy Kidz Mariah, "Chosen" from My Doll Best Friend
Emil: Götz Happy Kidz Emilia

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Note: No dolls were harmed during production of this blog. All dolls shown are Götz Happy Kidz, Classic Kidz or Little Kidz. If you like these stories and are willing, please make a donation of any amount to St. Jude Children's Research Hospital or any organization that supports pediatric cancer research and treatment. We are not affiliated with St. Jude in any way other than these donations.

"The Doll's Storybook" is not affiliated with Gotz Dolls USA Inc. or Götz Puppenmanufaktur International GmbH.
Watch for the next story each Friday afternoon at 1:00 PM Pacific Time.

Mariah: Stories from The Doll's Storybook, Emil: Stories from The Doll's Storybook, Classic Tales Retold: Stories from The Doll's Storybook, Our Favorite Verses: Poems from The Doll's Storybook and More Classic Tales Untold: Stories from The Doll's Storybook are available from BookBaby and other booksellers worldwide, such as Amazon and Barnes & Noble. 

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