I used to go out after dark, when our house was the last one in the subdivision and the streets and houses to come were just slabs of concrete that did not obscure the sky nor cast any light, and look up at the stars until I felt I had left my body and was floating around out there. I wanted to go out there more than I wanted anything else in the world.
We all stayed up late and watched the moon landing on the black-and-white TV, puzzling the dog mightily. We watched on CBS, because Walter Cronkite, in my mother's opinion, was the only newscaster who was properly excited about the situation. My father wanted Huntley and Brinkley, but we didn't watch them that night.
I couldn't sleep afterwards. Going to the stars was suddenly real, and I knew I wouldn't do it. I had read too much Heinlein to think I would get there. I was the clumsy, careless, stupid person who endangered everybody by acting as if they were still back on earth. Having seen the tiny capsule, the puffy awkward suits, having heard the quality of the radio transmissions, having seen the immense blackness of the unfiltered sky, I knew I wasn't going there.
It was still a very happy night, because I knew that somebody else was.
Pamela
Edited to correct a very elementary mathematical error. See, Heinlein was right.
