Reach for the Stars

Mary Baird
Sep 8, 2018 · 2 min read

Ah, Moon — and Star!
You are very far —
But were no one
Farther than you —
Do you think I’d stop
For a Firmament —
Or a Cubit — or so?

— 240, Emily Dickinson,

When I was young, I was obsessed with astronomy. Like most children, I memorised the names of all of the planets (though for me that was before I could string full sentences together). I listened to The Magic School Bus: Get Lost in Space so much, I could repeat it line by line. I would drag my parents out of bed at odd hours (9pm, 11pm, 12am, 3am, 5am, and every moment in between) to stare at an odd pattern of stars, the brilliance of the night sky, or the way that the clouds interacted with the light of the moon. I was enamored with the night sky and the concept of space.

But there was a bit of a problem. For one, I couldn’t always find books on subject material that I needed to increase my understanding at a level I could read. I was a good reader, but understanding the gravitational pull and crush of space clouds, the pressure of supernovas and the interaction of galaxies millions of light-years across as a seven-year old was a bit beyond me. So instead, I sat and I learned about the language people used to describe stars. I studied the sciences I could get my hands on — biology, chemistry, geology and paleontology. I studied language, mathematics, and history. I learned what people wrote about stars, and what people had studied stars. In the process, I began to learn more than one would expect.

And at the same time, I began to forget my original drive.

I found it again in the most unfortunate way. Space had been a place I had always wanted to go, but it was out of my reach. Literally. I was too short. Of course, by that point I had figured out that mathematics was not my strong suit.

Still, I persisted.

I could not touch stars with my hand, so instead I touched them with my pen, with my brush, with my sculptor’s hands. I touched the stars with my tongue as I taught the next generation what would come. I taught them about the wonders of space I could finally understand from the complex books and figures and jargon used by those brilliant minds who send bits of Earth to Space and bring fragments of Space to us. I stared at the glimmering mass through the mist and the fog and the clouds and the pollution filling up the skies. I persisted. No one would take my first love from me, and in the face of this challenge, I will give my love to the next round of spirits who will long for the stars.

Love is not finite. Love is infinite, and belongs on Earth as well as in Space.

Mary Baird

Written by

A student at George Fox University with a vested interest in seeing the world last another generation.