Somehow, I knew that I would never be bored again.

There was a faint light that swirled around me in wispy tendrils. It was made up of trillions upon trillions of super tiny particles, that sparked with light when they interacted with each other. They flowed as if they were dancing in joy at being created. Joy because they existed.

I laughed. Laughed because I knew joy as well. I had just created light! Something I had always thought about, hoped for, dreamed of, something that I had wanted. Now I have It. There was light. It wasn’t dark anymore!

Well... It was dark beyond the light. It was just around me after all. There was darkness dancing across me as well. Shadows. Something caused by blocking light.

I danced and sang with joy. Danced with the light and the shadows. Sang the best words I knew and the best sounds I knew.

I reached out to feel the light. It was warm and my hand tingled as it passed through the light. I could feel it flowing over my skin and between my fingers. I watched as my hand caused more swirls to form, giggling all the while.

I didn’t even need to think, I could just watch. Watch as the light danced around me. Watch as shadows danced across me, avoiding the light. It was amazing.

Is this space now? Yes, I think it is. Wait... If I can create things... Can I make it so I’m not alone anymore?

The thought was thrilling to think about. The possibility that I might not be alone soon. I could create people. But wait. I shouldn’t get too excited yet. If I was going to create people then there were things I needed to do first. People needed a place to live. They needed a world.

I was going to create a world.

How do I create a world... a world is a planet... planets orbit the Sun. No, that wasn’t completely true. Planets orbit stars. Only a few planets orbit the Sun... How interesting. The Sun is the name of a star that Earth orbits! Earth... the name of a world. Is that where I was before I came to the void? Maybe... I can't remember. Anyways, I need a good star. Like the Sun!

Using my hands, I scooped some of the light floating around me and pressed it together into a ball shape. I let go... the light didn’t stay in a ball. Why? How are stars formed? Isn’t it because everything bunches together... Oh. Gravity. The pull that everything has on everything. That’s how stars stay together. How everything stays together.

Did I need to create gravity? Yes. Seems like I do.

I thought about everything I knew about gravity. Which was very little, but I thought about it anyway.

“Let there be gravity.”

Immediately, everything started moving closer together... but it was so slow... let’s speed things up. I scooped the misty lights and pushed them together. The lights actually stick together this time. As more and more of the faint light clumps together, the brighter it gets. And the other wispy lights start moving faster towards the small ball of light I had made.

Still too slow. Handful after handful, I push all of the wispy lights into the ball. The new star is really bright now. As the star grew it went from radiating brown light, to red light, to yellow light, then radiating yellowish white light. After a few moments, all of the faint wispy tendrils of light are now in the star. The star is really dense now, all the pressure of gravity condensing everything down to the size of a baseball... What's a baseball? Oh, well. I can pursue that train later. Right now I am busy!

What a novelty. What a joy. To be too busy to think.

The star I had made... shouldn’t it be bigger? Why did I assume that stars would be bigger than me? This one seems to be doing just fine; its thermonuclear fusion is going strong... Woah, that's a big word that came out of nowhere! That means that the hydrogen atoms are becoming Helium... right? Is that what those super small particles I see are? It must be. So those are atoms... Interesting.

I tried to think of the Sun. How big was the sun? Was this star bigger or smaller?... Considering that I have never seen the Sun, I can’t actually answer that question with confidence. But my gut says that this star is slightly bigger than the Sun.

I must be huge! Worlds are smaller than stars, and people live on worlds... Was I ever a person? I’m pretty sure that I was, so how did I get so big? I must not be a person anymore. Maybe that is why I was in that nothingness! Maybe I wasn’t being punished after all, but I just wasn’t a person anymore. I became... something else. What am I? I have lived for a super long time... I can create stars... Am I a god? That’s a new word. God. Creator. Deity... Yes, I must be a god. Is it normal for gods to lose all their memories?

I shrugged, then turned my attention back over to my star. It was beautiful. Burning at just over 6,000 degrees Kelvin... Kelvin? Is that the name of a unit of measurement? It is... specifically for heat... Interesting. The star was a bright yellowish white color, and it bubbled excitedly. Large loops of plasma sprang up from the star’s surface, before splashing back down.

I floated there next to my star and held it cupped in both hands, watching it bubble away. I could see its core rapidly fusing new helium atoms, I could see the mantle swirling in large convection currents. The radiation released from the core’s fusion kept the star from collapsing in on itself. The amount of energy was incredible.

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Beautiful. All of its movement and energy was beautiful.

As I watched, the hydrogen in the core fused together into helium seemingly at random. It wasn't random though. Because everything was constantly moving and spinning, the pressure on certain parts of the core also fluctuated. The change in pressure wasn't much, but I could still see the slight increase of fusion where pressure grew.

Helium formed slowly and, when it was formed, it sank towards the center of the core. There wasn't enough pressure or heat yet for the Helium to start fusing, so it just collected in the core.

I could predict what was going to happen. Once enough helium collected, the pressure would be great enough to start fusing into a new element... And wouldn't that release an even greater energy than the gravity holding the star together?

This is going to be fun!

I watched as the hydrogen all slowly fused together. I also watched the swirling and bubbling of the surface and the large convection zone, but I was mostly anticipating the change in the core.

Eventually, the last of the hydrogen in the core fused away. There was so much pressure that the hydrogen in the mantle right next to the core started fusing as well. Temperature spiked into an all-time high, igniting the helium's fusion.

The star exploded in size. My head and chest were engulfed by the star, and I laughed as the particles danced and swirled around me. I floated backwards to get out of the now giant red star. The color change was interesting! The size change was interesting! Everything was just so amazing and wonderful, that I couldn’t help but laugh and dance and sing.

What was once the size of a baseball was now a full arm length across. The star was still bright, but some spots were brighter than others. It was constantly shifting as the star spun and radiated energy.

Inside the core, the helium was fusing differently than the hydrogen had. Three helium fused together to make carbon... Carbon... I knew that word.

Isn’t that what most living things are made out of?

I didn’t know how I knew that, it just came to me just like most things that I now know have. It didn’t really bother me that things just randomly pop into my head, in fact I thought it was exciting! New things are always exciting after all.

Anyways, back to the star. The newly formed carbon sometimes fused together with one of the helium to form oxygen or nitrogen. This helium stuff really gets around... It was fusing together so much quicker than the hydrogen had in the core and was still fusing around the core of helium. This new stage of the star wouldn’t even last half as long as the first stage had. As more of the heavier elements were created, more heat and pressure were added to the mix of elements, causing more fusions to take place. Carbon atoms fused together to create silicon, argon, and other heavier elements. Silicon fused together to create iron, titanium, and even more heavier elements.

As soon as the first iron atom was created, I knew that the star was on its last stage. The iron wasn’t reacting with anything, there just wasn’t enough energy for it to fuse together. It just sank to the center and collected into a dead center.

Something to note was that as the helium fused away into the heavier elements, the star was shrinking back down to its original size. It didn’t quite get that small though, because once enough of the heavier elements formed the star started expanding again. Not as rapidly as the first time, but this time most of the mass was blown far away from the core, creating a nebulous cloud of dust. The cloud didn’t return to the now tiny white star in the center. In fact most of it was slowly moving away, having escaped the white star’s gravity. Only a small portion of the cloud looked like it would eventually gather together into balls of gas and orbit the white star.

But for now the white dwarf star had a beautiful nebula of red, yellow, orange, and blue clouds surrounding it. The nebula looked like a giant eye, far bigger than I was.

The small white star was extremely hot and dense. It was cooling slightly, but it would take a really long time before it completely cooled. I had plenty of time to watch, this was after all, the single most beautiful and interesting thing that I had ever seen so far.

It was that “so far” thought that really excited me. But I will wait until this star is finished, it was my first star, I wanted to treat it with the respect it deserved... then it would be time to really explore all the possibilities.

As predicted, most of the cloud had flown off far into the distance and some had collected to form frozen rocky planets or balls of gas or just orbiting debri. None of them were habitable, as that would require them to be orbiting extremely close to the star. And none of the planets were particularly noteworthy other than “Hey, planets!” The planets didn’t seem to do anything other than orbit the white star.

Still, I was happy. Happier than I had ever been.

I was no longer in a void of nothingness. I was no longer left alone with my thoughts. I had things to do, things to watch. I had to choke back tears as I watched the white star cool.

Eventually, the light of the white star dimmed and faded into black. The universe was lightless once more.

The star was completely dead.

There was only a super dense ball of cold iron.

I sighed. From birth to death, the star was amazing. It created so many new elements and experiences for me... Let’s do it again.

I grabbed the ball of iron, it was about the size of a little pebble... well, for me at least... I was going to keep this as a remembrance of my first star.

Now that I properly watched the full process of a star, it was time to experiment!

I imagined the entire universe filled with those first little particles that I had seen. Not super dense though, but a fine mist covering everything.

“Let it be so,” I said, impressing my will upon the universe.

Instantly, space roiled. Matter was created. The entirety of existence was covered in atomic mist. Gravity took hold and pulled clouds together, forming nebulae. Stars of all sizes formed, from the small red ones to the super massive red and blue giants. Massive stars exploded into black holes or neutron stars. Those supernovas were especially interesting. Not only were they light-year-spanning explosions, but they also created enough energy to push iron into a fusion reaction, which created so many new and interesting elements.

I watched as the universe was filled with so much light and energy, and this time I did cry. When one was as happy as I was, it was impossible to hold back. I let myself fully experience my joy and relief. My tears dissipated into the universe, becoming one with it; infusing it with a tiny part of my power.

When I had finished crying a good cry, I wiped my eyes free of tears and looked again at my creations. My tears had fused with the universe, making everything seem more vibrant and whole. Somehow everything seemed as if it was more prone to coming alive. Everything now had a tiny part of my divinity, a tiny spark of it. An energy of creation, control, and will.

Warmth filled my chest, love for what I had created. I was so alone and bored... and all of a sudden, I wasn’t. I was saved from an endless torment of nothingness. I was free, and everything was full of light now.

“I love you,” I told the universe, watching all of its motion.

The stars twinkled in response.