Beam Me Up Scottie . . . (94)

From childhood to adulthood, I have been a sucker for space.  I grew up looking at fireworks and stars, then satellites, then shuttles, then space stations and through all of that,  meteor showers. 

I could go into great detail about the various launches I have seen or the wondrous meteor showers I have observed but I would be better off limiting it to a few things.  First, a nice quote from Carl Sagan who opened the doors of space observation to many an unsuspecting person:

“Somewhere, something incredible is waiting to be known.”

Don’t you just love that?  He had a way of opening his eyes and letting us see through them.

 Anyway, back to my main subject.  My first real satellite gazing happened when I was a child, living in Florida in the early 1960s.  In those days we had so many interesting things going on–Civil Rights Movement, Cuban Missile Crisis, Space Development at Cape Canaveral.  And I was a young girl trying to figure out who I was and why I was way taller than the other girls but not as developed (if you know what I mean).  So much to think about and yet standing in the backyard with my family at night watching Echo or Echo II sail silently through our velvety black southern skies captured my imagination.  What could it all lead to?  Would we end up living in outer space?  Would they even let women go to outer space?

I had a good friend in 7th grade, another girl, that had her focus set on the space program.  Claudia was her name.  I remember her so well because she was smart and she was determined to be a part of the space program.  To this day I don’t know if she achieved her goal.  (Claudia, please check in here.)

On January 28, 1986, I had just finished reading Carl Sagan’s novel, Contact. It was an interesting sci-fi story with a bit of a hopeful stream running through it. Our nation was just branching into a new, exciting avenue of education by sending a teacher into space on a shuttle mission. The launch had been postponed due to bad weather at the Florida launch site and was rescheduled to take place on the morning of January 28th if all was well. Everything seemed to check out alright. About the time of take off, I was at work and was standing near our Wall Street reporter, a machine that printed out news from Wall Street on a moment to moment basis. Glancing down at the yellow roll of paper in the machine, I saw it start streaming out at break neck speed. I couldn’t believe what I read. The shuttle Challenger had exploded after take off and all aboard were believed dead. I was devastated. I headed to the restroom and cried for about a half hour, then headed home. I had to see the news reports on television to truly believe this horrible thing had happened. The rest of that day and most of the evening I stayed glued to the TV, feeling a mix of sorrow, horror, and hopelessness. To this day I don’t know why it had such an impact on me.

My hope came back for space missions with the launch of the International Space Station on November 20, 1998. Coming at the end of a century, it seemed like an appropriate way to wrap up one phase of space discovery and head into the new millennium with a new mission. I still enjoy hearing about what’s happening ‘up there’ and am glad it is still accomplishing goals in scientific discovery. Our local weather man occasionally announces when we in St Louis can watch it pass overhead. Several times this year my husband and I have stood outside in the wee hours of the morning, in the freezing cold, watching the station move through our sky. I am not the same person I was when I stood as a child with my parents and watched Echo, but I still feel the same sense of excitement and wonder seeing that bright spot of light cross the horizon.

(FYI: The musical recording Telstar, by the Tornados, was released in 1962 and reached the top of the US Billboard Hot 100 in December 1962. The composer, Joe Meek, did not receive any royalties for the tune because of a plagiarism law suit filed by French composter Jean Ledrut. Three weeks after the suicide of Joe Meek in 1967, the law suit was settled in Joe’s favor.)