I've recently started watching Tom Hanks' Emmy- and Golden Globe-winning 1998 HBO miniseries, From the Earth to the Moon - a stirring, rigorously fact-based account of the Apollo program. And at the same time, I've been immersing myself in the vast photographic archives of the Moon landings looking for material for the next entry in my solar system series, which is about the Moon. Well, my cup of inspiration runneth over - I am overwhelmed with the beauty of what I see, and the vicarious excitement of experiencing the Apollo program through the HBO miniseries. And just to add to it all, I've been having adventures of my own taking to hiking local wilderness trails and finding surprises around every corner. The Moon diary is a few days away from completion at earliest, so I just can't hold myself back from sharing this.
Recently, I got caught out in the semi-wilderness alone after dark without a light, but a funny thing happened: The yellow full Moon rose over the horizon, the stars were brighter than I'd ever seen, and despite the tingling awareness of my own vulnerability at the base of my spine every time I heard a loud rustle in the brush nearby, I was full of joy. I had never been in that area or that situation before, and I wanted to answer the ominous basso growling I heard who-knows-where by breaking out in fearless song - that is, if I hadn't been terrified that I'd come within earshot of another human being and feel like a complete ass. The point is, I was cold, alone, tired, blind as to the ground beneath me, and in some mild degree of danger, but the only thoughts swirling in my head when I got home were about how I was going to go back (in daylight, of course).
I realize now that this is the same feeling that originally mesmerized me as a child whenever I'd see images of outer space and read science fiction novels describing intrepid explorers of the unknown - the same feeling that would tickle the underside of my consciousness when I'd look at far hills and feel the ineffable urge to discover what was on the other side of them. It was even the biggest motive for me when I played videogames - not to score points, not to "win," but simply to see what new experiences, new vistas, and new soundtracks the game had to offer. The same trancelike sense of being in heaven would come over me whenever an unexpectedly beautiful sight or bit of music would be revealed, even if it was just a cut-scene with no "gameplay" per se. Later in life, driving, I would turn in a random direction and follow the road as far as it went, and no matter what it showed me - brilliant mountainscapes or empty plains, graffitied industrial buildings or manicured houses, cookie-cutter commercial centers or the glass abstractions of corporate offices - I'd be enthralled in the same dreamlike sense of being in a state of perpetual revelation.
And now, watching From the Earth to the Moon, I'm reminded of all that, and of the fact that this experience can be and has been shared by an entire nation - in fact, an entire world. That the impoverished in their suffering, the wealthy in their social games and ennui, the greedy in their emptiness, the compassionate in their anguish for the pain of the world, and those who are normally unimaginative and bleak, were for a moment more than themselves, and stood in awe of blurry television images or even just radio broadcasts for the simple knowledge that a living, breathing person not unlike themselves was walking on a celestial object in their sky. People who did not understand this feeling in themselves soon went back to their regularly-scheduled programming, but somewhere in themselves they knew - we all knew - that humanity had glimpsed a world without end: A universe of surprises and possibilities.
Whatever cynical basis had motivated the beginning of the Apollo program and sustained it through its trials, humanity learned in its moment of triumph that it was worthwhile in itself - that, in fact, nothing else is more worthwhile. That whatever else we do, is simply for the chance at this. We survive and evolve so that we may do this, not the other way around. But the moment was too large to contain, too profound to hold on to in the corrosive environment of the picayune. In the social convulsions, pointless destruction, and growing solipsism of the age, our eye turned away from the awesome and toward the merely gratifying, and has never quite returned despite the occasional flicker of memory invoked by a robotic probe.
But we can, and will, go back to that place in ourselves that takes us to everywhere else, and makes all other things possible. We as a nation, and we as a species. And once we do, we will make a home in that sense of perpetual discovery - a transformation in social consciousness that will make the world today seem like a terrified, spineless medieval village gazing at its own navel and ignorant that there even is anything beyond the horizon, let alone curious to find what it is. It will happen, and is happening as we speak through the efforts of great visionaries like Elon Musk and others, but the beginning of our return to Adventure is unfolding so slowly. I wish I could do something to make it happen faster - wish there was some skill I had that I could volunteer, or that I had the money to bring it to fruition earlier. If I were an engineer, I would be willing to work for minimum wage to make this happen. If I were a billionaire, I would plow every last cent into it above what would keep me in a middle-class lifestyle.
The problem is one of chickens and eggs, because I know humanity would easily get caught up in such a thing once it got going in earnest - not a program toward any particular destination, but a program to all destinations: A program to push back boundaries, explore what is newly accessible, study what is newly explored, settle and flourish where the potential exists, and our humanity be enriched by the birth and growth of new civilizations, new ecosystems, and new possibilities. But as long as this appears out of practical reach, few would be interested in committing resources to it. Slowly - ever so damned slowly - the tight Gordian Knot is being unraveled, and we approach closer to the day when time will be on our side; when the call of Adventure grows louder in our hearts, and the troubles that afflict our days seem not so important in the light of a Full Moon and the fathomless sky full of stars.
The great intelligentsia of the world will often note how crucial it is to go beyond Earth for the sake of survival, to prevent catastrophes from bringing about our extinction, but that is only the most paltry of reasons. We could bring up its economic potential, its power to politically unify and philosophically advance mankind, and the healing power of the optimism it inspires. But far more than even that, beyond all reasons and words, is simply this:
