Astronomy

During a car ride yesterday, my son began asking lots of astronomy questions. He asked how the sun burns. I tried to answer to the best of my abilities. I said the sun burns because of nuclear fusion, the pressures created by gravity, chemical processes, and physics. He asked how the planets formed. I said the planets formed due to the accretion of dust and matter, and that as the rocky balls got bigger, they acquired more gravity that then attracted more matter until the planets formed. He asked more questions until I could not keep up. But I am glad he and his sister are interested in astronomy. As a child, I loved reading about astronomy and looking at photos and pictures of stars, the solar system, and galaxies. We should every so often look up into the night sky and ponder the vastness and mysteries of the universe.