Last week Spencer and I went to the Clark Planetarium and watched the Hubble 3D movie. I've never been very intrigued by space. I'm quite content with the little world and the little life that the Lord has given me here. This movie, however, helped to open my eyes and I am amazed at ALL of the Lord's creations. I was especially struck by the images of super nova and super nebula; they are glorious...truly out of this world. This movie has reminded me that God has made more than what is involved in my minuscule realm of this world. It puts a new perspective on the creation and scriptures that mention other worlds which God has made.
Basically Spencer and I have been in space for a week. Spencer more than myself I would say. I've seen him get excited about things, but never like this. It makes sense though, growing up he planned to attend Utah State University in Logan and go through their Aerospace engineering program. Now (a.k.a. since we met) he's planning on attending the U for Bio-mechanical engineering (also very cool).
We visited the library and found PBS, NOVA, and NATIONAL GEOGRAPHIC documentaries on space. I had NO IDEA so much was going on! You'd think the news would make a bigger deal of it! We watched the movie Apollo 13 last week as well and a line from it keeps coming back to me and reminds me of how our media treats space now. "We've made going to space as interesting as driving to Pittsburgh." Unbelievable.
Perhaps the most interesting documentary was one I found about the Mars Rovers. I always thought there was one....there are two "Spirit" and "Opportunity". They were supposed to last 90 sols (martian days, which are 24 hrs and 39 mins in length), they've lasted 5 years and counting! Watching that documentary also showed me that God has had his hand in our attempts to discover space as well. Aside the fact that these rovers have well exceeded expectations so many things happened to them on Mars that "all of a sudden" corrected themselves, or despite all odds have not affected the progress of the rovers. There is little doubt in my mind that the Lord supports our space exploration. NASA has built another rover, larger than the two previous, they call it "Curiosity"! I wonder how long it will last?
We also watched a documentary about the International Space Station. Life in space has improved greatly. Did you know that for $200,000.00 you could fly to space? If you search Virgin Galactica you'll learn more. Spencer is all over the idea...I'm a little more hesitant. We almost work backward of each other. He gets immediately excited and thinks of all the possibilities then the "to do" and the "what ifs" start settling in, never dampening his sense of adventure or desire, but putting a realistic twist on things. I, on the other hand, "what if" and "how" and "to do" from the beginning. The more I let the idea sink in the more appealing it becomes...or less appealing if it isn't a good idea in the first place. Spencer and I went back to the planetarium last night to test telescopes (the gift shop allows customers to test various telescopes on Friday and Saturday nights) but the sky was overcast. We'll try again soon.
I've been reading The Education of a Wandering Man by Louis L'Amour (a fantastic book) and in it he spoke of space. He believes that all our history leading up to orbiting the moon and then landing on the moon is "preliminary". Everything else has been done before. Traveling to and exploring space is when our history began. I would agree for the most part. Landing on the moon is when we made our mark, when we went where no man on earth has gone before, it is when possibilities became endless... What will they think of next?
LOOK UP! So much is out there beyond the stars (which are, for the most part, small solar systems and galaxies). It's remarkable. Visit www.NASA.gov for everything awesome and space related (the images tab is my favorite, there are enough pictures to keep you at your computer for days).
"Heart and Soul Nebula"
