Drifting in the Space of Ramblings

Ramblings About Childhood

Childhood was the best time of my life; it all seems perfect, and I have no complaints about that time.

I remember being small, watching "You Only Live Twice," where at the beginning of the movie, a spacecraft is hijacked by the criminal organization S.P.E.C.T.R.E., and an astronaut is left drifting in space... Just like me. I remember wondering what would happen to that astronaut when I watched the movie. It's strange that I hadn't remembered that scene until now. I'm almost like a background character in a movie about the English spy, but now there's no Cold War, and my rocket hasn't been hijacked by the megalomaniac Blofeld.

My childhood was filled with a lot of fantasy. Movies, comic books, stories, games, dreams, and fun. Every child should have a childhood like mine.

Most other kids were afraid of monsters and horror movie characters, but I was always different. I was afraid of E.T., yes, the one with the long, glowing finger. I always had a loathing for that little guy. I remember being embarrassed to say I was terrified of him, and my mother, thinking I liked the movie, bought me a doll. It was the longest-lasting trauma of my life. At night, I had to hide that doll so I wouldn't imagine it lurking in the dark room. I think there's no more disgusting, gross, ugly, and revolting creature in cinema than E.T.

My sister had the most fertile imagination, lying to her friends that her bed was magical and could travel to places worthy of a Roald Dahl book. Some of her friends believed her and would ask her questions for hours. It was even funnier when my cousin joined in, also making up adventures he had while traveling on that bed, and her friends believed even more with another person corroborating the story.

I never wanted my childhood to end; maybe that's my biggest difficulty—I must suffer from Peter Pan Syndrome. I don't want to grow up; I resisted until the last minute. I avoided responsibilities like the devil avoids the cross. Being an astronaut had much more to do with childhood dreams than with the responsibilities the profession demands. I didn't want to be an astronaut in a Kubrick film; I wanted to be an astronaut like Buck Rogers or Flash Gordon.

The truth is that being an astronaut is a drag.

I think if I weren't about to die now, I would have given up being an astronaut in the near future.

Even now, drifting in space, the boy inside me dreams of the possibility of being rescued by a Klingon ship or being caught by Sardath's Zeta Beam and transported to the far reaches of the universe to the planet Rann.

I smile at the possibility of this happening. I know it won't happen, but the boy inside me looks at the stars still fascinated, dreaming of the thousands of possibilities for one last adventure.