The First Astronaut

"Lit up with anticipation
We arrive at the launching site
The sky is still dark, nearing dawn
On the Florida coastline..."

–Rush, Countdown

"I'm going to be an astronaut," she said.

"That's awesome," we said.

This after our visit to the Kennedy Space Center over the summer. Both our girls loved seeing all the rockets and the Atlantis space shuttle that day, and it was especially poignant that we were there on the 50th anniversary of the Apollo 11 launch. But it was our youngest Bryce who really fell in love with the idea of space travel. So much so that she begged us to buy her an astronaut suit and NASA hat to wear while we were at the space center.

After some negotiation with Mom and Dad about how much she would spend out of her allowance "spend" money and how much we would cover, we bought the space suit. It was a muggy 95+ degrees outside in Florida that day, and she wore that suit the rest of the afternoon. Shortly after that, she made me promise that come Halloween this year, I'd go as her space shuttle.

I loved the idea of space travel when I was her age. I remember I took a summer astronomy class when I was 10 and the teacher let me each take the telescope home one night. I stayed outside for what seemed like hours, looking at the planets and the stars, until my mom told me it was time to go to bed.

Two years later, Star Wars came out, and that's all she wrote for me. I dove in so deep I've never looked back since. Neither Bryce nor Beatrice have taken to these movies like I have, but there's still time, considering there are many new Star Wars stories to come.

Then came the first space shuttle launch in April of 1981. The space shuttle Columbia was the first space-rated orbiter in NASA's Space Shuttle fleet and such an amazing feat of engineering, science and technology. My favorite band Rush would be inspired to write a song called Countdown about this very launch, a song that still gives me chills today. This inspiration would come after NASA invited Rush to be part of a select group to view the first launch of a space shuttle. So very cool.

This October came and went pretty fast, metaphorically at the speed of light, with work and family trips consuming over half of it. When we returned from these trips, Bryce reminded me of the space shuttle, and I had to quickly get to work on it to complete it before the Halloween events commenced.

I love being creative when I can, and I had lots of cardboard, a roll of white paper, rope, packing tape and marking pens to work with. In less than two hours I created a really simple representation of the space shuttle Columbia, complete with American flags that Bryce made for the shuttle. When she said she was only going to draw three stars, I asked her why, and she said "because". Fair enough. Maybe she was channeling the three band members of Rush. I can dream at least.

We also showed both girls some of the the video of the two female American astronauts who recently took part in the first all-female spacewalk. They'd been tasked with replacing a power controller, and had ventured out of the International Space Station. So awesome to watch. It was also so much fun when I showed the recruiting team at Jet Propulsion Laboratory, one of many organizations that participate in the Talent Board candidate experience benchmark research program I run, the picture of my daughter and I dressed as astronauts and space shuttle. In fact, they said they're hiring!

Bryce was so happy and proud to have me as her space shuttle Columbia at every Halloween event we went to this year, including the Halloween parade at her and her sister's school that all the students participate in. I got a lot of orbit miles out of that cardboard space shuttle in just under one week.

"I'm going to be the first female astronaut to go to the moon," Bryce has told us over and over again.

We of course agreed and, who knows, we may just see her do that someday. And while I don't ever want to take away anything from her about being the first female to go to the moon, to Mars and to who knows where else as the future becomes now again, we long for the day when we can just call her the first astronaut, because.

"Excitement so thick, you could cut it with a knife
Technology high, on the leading edge of life
Like a pillar of cloud, the smoke lingers
High in the air
In fascination with the eyes
of the world we stare..."