Writer's Retreat ramblings: Astronomy (part 1)

Today, we were given a prompt: When I grow up. Immediately, I thought that the best way to attack this was to tap into my Grade One self. It was a lot of fun. 

When I grow up, I want to be an astronomer. Everybody else wants to be a doctor, or a pilot, but I want to be an astronomer. I have books at home that talk about space, the possibility of life outside Earth, and the vastness of the universe. They have pictures of planets unlike Earth – which is pictured as a massive blue marble. My favorite is Saturn, with its rings crowning it, next is Jupiter, because it is the largest that even the Earth is a puny planet compared to it. There is also Mars, which is as red as the Earth is blue; and Venus, which is said to be Earth’s twin, but aren’t twins supposed to look like each other? Venus doesn’t look appealing to me at all.

I want to be the first Filipino astronomer. I want to discover planets like the Earth, or discover aliens that aren’t like the aliens in Aliens. But most of all, I want to be in Houston, where I’m part of the team that maneuvers and guides astronauts when they fly to space to do different missions. I think I will thrive in that environment, even though every movie I’ve seen that’s related to space depicts Houston as a place dominated by men. There’s no way that I’ll come to work in a black and white suit. I’ll come there wearing a dress, and maybe a flower on my head, and purple-colored glasses.

I don’t want to be an astronaut. I was told by people who also love space that if something goes wrong with the astronaut’s suit when they come back to Earth, their organs get messed up. I don’t really know why – maybe because of the change in gravity? But basically that friend told me that my small intestine will get intertwined with my large intestine, my liver will collide with my stomach, and other unthinkable things will happen to my insides that will cause my body to malfunction, leading to an explosive and horrible death. There is absolutely NO WAY that I’d be an astronaut. I like watching gory deaths on TV, but it’s unthinkable to go that way.

There’s something fascinating about space. Even now, it’s hard to think about the vastness of the universe when you haven’t even been around your own planet. Scientists give you equations, but I’m a very visual person. When I look at the stars at night, I see that the universe is indeed vast. I know that the faintest of light emitted by a star is a sure sign that there is a huge ball of gas swirling millions of light years away.