jessicareacrwr213-blog

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Leaving

Today’zz the day.  I woke up thizz morning with a pit in my stomach.  I’m leaving.  I’m going Outzide. I’ve been looking forward to thizz day for azz long azz I can pozzibly remember, but now that it’zz here, I don’t feel ready.  I can almozt see it from here, Outzide which hazz alwayzz hung there, above uzz, azz a bright, white hole through which I watch the otherzz dizapeare and reappear to no end.  A shining portal that offerzz infinite pozibilitiezz to thoze brave enough to take it.  I thought I wazz brave enough, but now, staring into the Outzide, I am paralyzed.

My whole life, all I’ve known are the confinezz of Hive.  The sticky, deliciouzz, honey which glowzz like amber and taztezz like liquid gold.  All I have ever known izz sweet. The neverending huzztle of our home which never sleepzz.  The loudnezz, the never ceazing soundzz of the life that zurroundzz me. The safe, warm, familiar cornerzz and tunnelzz which I can navigate with my eyezz clozed.  When I crozz the threshold and enter a world entirely new, everything I have ever known will be ztripped away. How will I know where I am Outzide? Outzide in the great huge world with no cornerzz or tunnelzz?  Will Outzide be deafeningly quiet?   Will I become completely overwhelmed by everything that izz not the zame?

What if Outzide izz amazing? What if it offerz all I could ever want? Will Outzide change me?  Will I loze myzelf in utopia and never want to return to Hive?  Will I want to explore forever the expanzezz of the world, abandoning Hive and Queen and Family?  Thizz pozzibility izz even more terrifying.  

Who will I bee Outzide? My whole life I have known exactly my role within Hive.  I am daughter, sizter, worker, and attender. Outzide I will be none of thoze thingz.  And so what will I bee?

I ztand facing Outzide, ztaring into the threshold of infinity, paralyzed by the unknown.  Maybe I will never feel ready? But Outzide izz calling me.  I can feel it pulling me towardzz the new world, waiting for me to dizcover.  I stretch my wingz and begin ascending.  Rizing higher and higher, towards the beacon of promize above our headz, the warmth of Outzide on my face growing stronger.  I feel something completely alien ruztle through my wingz and realize it’zz a breeze, carrying on it smellzz of zomething that izn’t sweet, and soundzz that are foreign to my earzz.  

Here izz the moment, I am about to crozz the point where I can never go back to knowing only Hive.  I am brave enough. I propel myzelf over the edge, blinded by the sky and light emanating from all around me.  My senzes overwhelmed from all directionzz, but I am not scared.  Everything izz different but I am still me.  Ready to explore what Outzide hazz for me.

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Harry Belafonte - TURN AROUND

Leaving

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Leaving

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Leaving

dive in

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Leaving

(please click for gif)

Enniskillen, County Fermanagh, Northern Ireland

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Drifting

Today will be astronomical.  Today, for a brief moment, the earth will be visible to my eyes. Today, I will reset the countdown until my next blissful glimpse at my long lost home.

I left Earth aboard the Falcon Heavy with mission VIASAT-3, 9 years ago, with five others.  We all had so much promise and excitement for adventure, space, and it’s infinite possibilities.  We had trained our bodies, our minds and our spirits in the most gruelling, intense ways.  Pushing ourselves to our limits and then past them in preparation for what was to come.  They called us superheroes.  They called us brave.  We thought we were. The problem with infinite possibilities is that there are endless encounters and reactions which are impossible to predict or plan for.  Murphy’s law proved true a thousand times, “anything that can go wrong will go wrong”.  After we thought we had mastered the knowledge and mysteries of the stars, the universe laughed at us and disobeyed just to prove us wrong. In the fifth month of our mission, the Red Super Giant we meant to pass, became unstable and suddenly entered its Supernova phase driving an expanding shock wave into the interstellar medium, separating my capsule from the main vessel and propelling me off course.  I watched in horror as the Falcon Heavy was pulled into the flares and destruction of the of the collapsing star, becoming completely eviscerated before my eyes.  The destruction was massive sending off a chain of activity among the chemical and material debris which was incredible to behold.  It had a terrifying beauty that was forever burned in my mind.  

My capsule drifted amongst the rubble for what felt like forever, until finally losing velocity and sliding into the orbit of a large asteroid.  

I was not brave. I was not a superhero.  I had been helpless to the peril of my colleagues and our vessel.  And now I was alone and lost. Though I had enough food to last years, my future was unknown.  I had no means of propulsion, communication, or salvation.  I sank into despair.  For months I orbited the asteroid despairingly, until it happened.  

I suddenly noticed a point of light that was not uniform with the endless blanket of stars which engulfed me.  It was a blue light.  And over several hours it grew to the size of my pinky nail, but I knew with certainty its identity.  It was Earth.  It was home. I had never been more sure of any knowledge in every fibre and molecule of my body.  I felt it.  A deep warmth growing within my chest, I feared it it may explode, for how could my material body contain so much energy? I was unable to calculate and pinpoint my location within the solar system, but it did not matter.  I was no longer lost.

I watched as Earth began to fade out of sight, feeling not loss, but rejuvenation.  I counted everyday that passed, believing, knowing, that eventually, I would glimpse it again.  And after 300 days, I was rewarded for my patience.  It appeared before me like a great cosmic miracle.  Every 300 days I experience this miracle.  Renewing my tether to the glowing blue orb.  I feel peace in imagining the 8.5 billion people moving through life upon its surface, unknowingly being watched and loved by a pair or drifting eyes.

I used to think my home was Hawthorne, California.  But now my true residence has opened itself in my mind.  I am a citizen of the Earth, the globe in its entirety.  Although I can never reach it again, it fills me with purpose and peace as my home.  

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David Bowie – Space Oddity (Official Video)

Drifting

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Drifting

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Drifting

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Drifting

eclipse: photographed by dscovr’s epic instrument, 9th March 2016.

13 frames. the first gif shows the images as they were shot, the 2nd arranged to leave the solar shadow motionless and the earth moving through it. 3rd gif shows a detail of the 2nd.

image credit: nasa.

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Returning

Today couldn’t come soon enough.  Today I won’t be incomplete no more. Aye, I’ll be whole again when I see my gorgeous lass.  When I hold ‘er in me arms and vow te not let ‘er go again. A promise I’ve made ‘er a thousand times before and broken just as much.  I can see the lighthouse off our bow, guidin’ us, growin’ bigger ‘n bigger, the closer we get the stronger I feel ‘er callin’ me, pullin’ me home.

This voyage, I’ve been aboard the Gideon Brown for eight months.  Settin’ sail from the port at St John’s, with a noble crew of fishermen, each kissin’ goodbye te our sweethearts, wives, or mothers.  It’s a partin’ I’ve made countless times over, me wife always stickin’ her photograph in me hands and makin’ me promise te hold onto it till I come back to‘er.  

Fer eight months we’ve been tossed around by the ocean, always makin’ sure we don’t forget how powerful she is, sendin’ all manner of gales te test our nerves.  Some o’ these poor lads, too young te know ‘er ways, cryin’ as they clung te the riggin’ as the waves crashed across the decks and plunged us into chaos. We’ve been knowin’ nothin’ but the great, grey expanse of the North Atlantic and the smell o’ salty, sea air.  Salt that clings te ev’ry surface, and quickly makes the idea’r of softness somethin’ you only know in yer dreams.  The thought of bein’ dry as fantastic as spottin’ a mermaid in the waves. The swellin’ and rollin’ under yer feet that never ends. The wind wippin’ across yer face and stingin’ yer skin.  No amount of dried cod enough te quiet the growlin’ in yer belly that only the loudest o’ storms can drown out. Seein’ nothin’ but the endless water and our own hardened faces.

But aye this mornin’, that changed.  I spied over the starboard side, and the waves didn’t go on fer’ever.  A small sliver o’ somethin’ solid cut through the horizon.  The rough shape o’ St John’s silhouetted in the mornin’ sun.  Each son upon the skooner found new fire in their bellies and pushed te make port.  As the day went on, we could make out more ‘n more o’ her beautiful shores, and I’ve never seen grown men so giddy.  

Anchorin’ just beyond port, we piled into the dingies and began paddlin’ to the docks.  I can see her waitin’ for me now.  Her face, the most beautiful I’ve ever seen, a beacon more bright than any lighthouse.  These last few meters between us stretchin’ longer than the last eight months.  The dingey bumps the dock and I step shakily onto solid ground, which welcomes me home.

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Returning

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Returning

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Returning

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