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| I have a friend from Wellesley College who is a real space cadet. A REAL SPACE CADET. Lt. Col. Pamela Melroy is an astronaut. We were both astronomy and physics double majors from the class of '83. Pam has wanted to be an astronaut since she was 11, and at Wellesley, she spent countless hours both studying and playing a crude, by today's standards, simulation game of "Star Trek" on the Observatory computer.
Within the year she'll be a Shuttle Pilot flying her first mission to help build the international space station. This year Pam was giving the Commencement Speach at Wellesley's graduation ceremonies. I am tickled for her! I am fortunate enough to live close by and I was to able to go see Pam to cheer her on before she goes into orbit. At 5 foot 4 inches, she may be the smallest possible shuttle pilot, but I bet it would be hard to find a nicer one. It was clear to all of us at the time that Pam would make a great astronaut. She had her path laid out ahead like a road map, and she followed it with all her energy. None of it came easily, except the decision making process. She knew what she wanted to do. Not all of us are so fortunate as to know what we want to do withour lives from the get go. Sometimes we grow out of older dreams. Sometimes not. Pam is the same kid who wants to be an astronaut when she grows up. She practically sparkles when when she talks about how proud she is of being able to get into her tiny space suit by herself. How do we decide what we want to do? How do we go about setting priorities? How do we choose where to focus our attentions? Sometimes what we want to do changes out from under us. This has happened to me more than once, most recently the cancellation of the Newton by Apple has meant that I now have to concentrate on the Palm Pilot and other platforms. It is the nature of the computer industry that the landscape of our life's work changes every six months or so, and our life story requires a nearly complete rewrite every couple of years. I'm actually getting used to that rhythm, and I'm comfortable with it. Sometimes we know what we want to do, but have fears that prevent us from even mentioning those desires out loud. We want to become a movie director, an actor, a star, but we are afraid of being a laughing stock for having the temerity to dream such a big dream. Ray Bradbury says "Who are your friends? Do they believe in you? Or do they stunt your growth with ridicule and disbelief? If the latter, you haven't friends. Go find some." Sometimes we know what we want in the intangibles of our lives. We want to love and be loved. We want to live with integrity and autonomy. We want respect. We want true and lasting happiness. Sometimes we can identify only the stuff we want. American society encourages this, but I think we need to be careful to analyze the dreams that are only material. There is nothing inherently wrong about wanting a big house or a Jaguar. You can get the house or the car with sufficient money, but they won't make you happy unless you know what aspect of the material thing was necessary to you. I used to want an house built by Acorn. I still admire the designs of the Acorn houses, and would love to live in one, but now I realize that what I really want is a clean pretty house with large windows and hardwood floors. I also know that I want certain people to live inside the house with me. This is an attainable goal, even if Acorn goes out of business. In fact, I can have that now, without spending my entire life's savings. This technique of identifying the essential properties also works when thinking about less material goals. It turns out that I wanted less to become an astronomer for my life's work than to test my intellectual limits. Astronomy was the hardest thing I could think of to study. If I could sit down to read the Astrophysical Journal, then I could do anything. As a result, I became a more confident person. The act of becoming self confident was much more important than the end result of becoming an astronomer. Studying astronomy was the vehicle for me. What part of your dreams have you already realized? What aspect of what you are setting out to do is the part that is truly important to you? Be sure to recognize your successes when they are right in front of you! Failures are important too. Doc Edgerton said "Failures are really more important that the successes, because you can check those off. You'll know not to do it that way next time." And Woody Allen said that if you succeed every time then you aren't aiming high enough. Falling on our noses is not a bad thing. It is an indicator of the terrain. Whatever part of your dreams you can identify with certainty will be the part that you can use to steer a course by. Start with what you know when setting your big priorities. If there are things that you don't know, you can always put down tasks for doing the research to find out more about it. I don't have much of a social life these days. Along with " do the laundry," social occasions routinely fall to the bottom of my list. I have purposefully cut that piece of my life's pie down to a thin sliver. However, my friends are dear to me, and I was glad to go to Wellesley and to make the time to see people who are important to me. Not just Pam, but the Observatory professors, young alums who I had never met in person, old friends who also stopped by to wish Pam well. Just because you've chosen to focus on one area, doesn't necessarily mean you have to give up everything else. The things that fall towards the bottom of our lists need our care and attention too. The things at the bottom of the list are not there only to distract us from our life's work. There is something in the essense of those tasks that have earned those tasks their right to be on the list. If that were not true, we would easily take them off the list, and not let them burden us. For me, I know that I need to keep up a little social life, I need to take the time to write a few letters, go to a few dinners, visit the Observatory. The corollary is don't let the things at the top of the list distract you when you do have an opportunity to do one of the tasks at the bottom of the list. I recently rediscovered that you really can cram a lot of friendship into a few hours if your friends have your full attention when you are with them. I used to write poetry on the Observatory blackboard late at night. On the occasion of the graduation of the class of 1998, I wrote this one for Pam:
And a Postscript for 10/29/98: ''We are placed here with certain talents and capabilities, It is up to each one of us to use those talents and capabilities as best we can. If we do that, I think there is a power greater than any of us that will place the opportunities in our way, a power greater than I am that will certainly see that I am taken care of if I do my part of the bargain.'' John Glenn, who goes into Earth orbit again today! |
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