Drifting in the Space of Ramblings

Ramblings About Comfort

This spacesuit is starting to bother me; I'm feeling cramped. Luckily, the suit has a compartment for peeing and staying dry. I wouldn't like to die all soaked in pee. An itch on the back of my neck grows, and I try to move my head and push back to make the back of my neck rub against the seal between the helmet and the suit.

I can't scratch the back of my neck properly, so I try to think of something else.

I wish I could use a bathroom one last time.

I try to move a bit, but the suit restricts my movements. I try to stretch; it's been a long time since I've moved while drifting through space. My leg is already tingling, and my neck is too tense. I pull my shoulders back, which relieves it a bit.

My head can't go back; the helmet won't let it. I can only turn my neck left and right. It's not enough to relieve the discomfort.

Some people find comfort in staying at home, lying in a good bed or a comfortable chair. Others prefer floating in a pool on a sunny day. I liked the woods, camping, and looking at the starry sky at night. Back then, I thought the sky seen from the middle of a forest was the most starry possible, but I've discovered that outside the atmosphere, there's no comparison.

I would lie on some rock or on the leaf-covered ground and meditate for hours. For me, that was comfort. There was no tent; I liked staying out in the open and feeling the cold air enter my lungs. The sound of leaves rustling, crickets and cicadas singing, the campfire crackling the dry wood, and the intermittent sound of some stream far in the background.

The next morning, you could fish in the stream, clean the fish, and cook it right away with the campfire still burning from the night before. I always thought I should have been born a long time ago, in a simpler time. I am a man living in the wrong era.

My sister used to say I must be the reincarnation of some woodsman, but I don't know if I believe in reincarnation. If it exists, I hope we reincarnate from the future to the past; I don't want to go further ahead. I'd like to go back to a simpler time on the planet, back. Who knows?

The only bad thing about the woods are the flies. If there were a fly in my helmet, I would have gone insane. I would have taken it off and died without oxygen just to avoid enduring that buzzing in my ear or feeling that mixture of thin legs amidst the sweat.

I hate flies.

I'd like to feel the comfort of a hug one last time.

The comfort of peace.

I've never felt peace with a hug; I've always felt insecure in all of them. Peace is the feeling of completeness. I've only felt peace in the middle of the woods and maybe now, here, dying in space in the middle of nowhere.

Despite everything—death looming closer, the loneliness, the discomfort, and the despair—I feel complete, at peace.

Isn't that strange?