Mike Massimino is an ex astronaut although I wonder if one can become an ex astronaut. When does an angel cease being an angel or a catholic stop being a catholic? Actually Mike Massimino is a catholic astronaut. That is not a contradiction or even a tautology. His dreams of walking in the stars were born in 1969 when Neil Armstrong and his crew went further than man ever has. He was born into a working class family in Long Island and it took a lifetime of studying and working hard to achieve his dream of following in Armstrong's example. The book details his many ups and downs and he writes with a simple honesty and a educated clarity, and a page turning enthusiasm. It also covers a turbulent and exciting period in the history of NASA, which in turn reflects the changing fortunes of America through the seventies to the present day.
Mike Massimino is also a huge fan of the film The Right Stuff, the film more so than the book, and he talks at every opportunity about the profound influence it had on his life. Chapter after chapter he refers back to it, inspired by the friendships and shared courage of the astronauts in the film, attempting to recreate that aspirational quality in his own life with the men and women he works with in the space program. They are all hugely talented people , hard working, patriotic, all seeking to better the fortunes of mankind. There is a great photograph which sums up this idea, that stands testimony perhaps to the power of dreams and how they may shape our lives. There is the picture of young Mike Massimino the school boy in an astronaut costume his mother made for him standing outside his home in July 1969 and in his hand is a Snoopy Space man toy. It is side by side with a picture of Mike Massimino the astronaut at work in space and floating next to him is the very same Snoopy Space man toy he held onto since then( Not every moment of course. I am sure he put it down for important things like going to school then college then work then marriage and children etc..you know, the building blocks of his life.) I do hope he cleared with NASA bringing the Snoopy Space man toy on board his craft and that he did not jeopardise the mission by bringing a non safety cleared item into a zero G enviroment.
You know on the same date I was also a school boy who stood outside our family home looking up at the moon and wondering about the men who walked up there for the first time in human history. "Well Da, Theres men up there tonight," I said pointing up at the moon. My da stood at our front door with his hands in his pockets smoking a park drive " Nah, theres nobody up there, its not real." he said in that way of his, that any other possible observation than his is just nonsense.
What a thing to say to an innocent boy who's mind contains images of dark lunar landscapes and the brave men who risked everything to walk there. What an off puttingly negative thing to say to an impressionable dreamer. Who knows, if he had said something positive I might have been an astronaut by now.
