The Ink Is Black (Blogophilia 20.7)






The ink is black
The page is white
Together we learn
To read and write…


This is the song that stuck in my head after reading this weeks assignment.  But I really couldn't fit Three Dog Night into a coherent post, so...

So you ask me what my ink is? It is my companion and my friend. The one thing I can count on in times of trouble and strife. It shares my secrets and I can choose if they get revealed... or not.  My characters can be part of me I wish to mock. To make fun of my bad habits and disjointed thought process.  And the evil traits of others, sometimes. 

I can be other people.  I can do evil and good.

This week is the anniversary of the Apollo moon landing.  If you have been reading me for a while, you know when I was 10, my family  lived in Orlando. This was during the height of the program. Everything in Central Florida was space themed.  Even "I Dream of Jeannie" was set there.   It was a heady time for a day dreaming 10 year old.  I kept Estes Hobby Products in business with my purchases of Models and engines.  My brother and I would shoot them off every weekend at the Junior High School track at the end of my street.  We got in trouble a couple of times when the wind would take the rockets over the Navy base. 

I would stay glued to the TV, watching  the men with the Right Stuff prepare for battle,dreaming that maybe it could be me taking the long elevator ride to the top of a 20 story aluminum tube strapped with explosives. Why, I'd be a hero! I'd sit in my cramped little seat with the ceiling of gauges 6 inches away, waiting for my date with destiny. 

Then it would all start.

My head turns into a pancake as the thrust of a couple of H-Bombs blew out the tail of the tube.   The sucking feeling of zero gravity as the craft slipped the bonds of gravity, my body pushing against the restraints.  The hours of waiting as the craft competes its trajectory across open space, hitting the target some 250,000 miles away. I would enter into the landing module not knowing whether it would land softly. I certainly wouldn't want to get stuck.  

Disembarking on the bleak Sea of Tranquility, sky the color of my mother's velvet Christmas dress, I could imagine me saying something a little more lively than "This is one small step".  Maybe "Yahoo!!! I made it", or something.  And I'd look on the rising Earth, as the only color all the day long against that oil black canvas of the vacuous sky.  I'd wonder if their was sound there. With no air or other medium to carry it, would anyone hear my shouts?  Would anyone care?

I always admired the guy who snuck the golf club on board, driving the ball however far it went.  If it were all just work, why would you volunteer?

Just because it is there, I guess.

Apollo 11 ended up be the last launch I saw. We moved back to Atlanta the next week and I ended up seeing the landing in motel room. Not nearly as much fun as being on the front yard and looking east to where the dot faded into the heavens.  

Seems so far away...


______________________________________________________________________________________________

Topic-Heather Blomquist

Pic-Barbara K.

Pic guesses:  
Astronomy lesson
Planetary Conjuction
System
Third rock
Lined up.

Comments

  1. thanks for sharing this part of your life, sure it was exciting as a child of 10 to see the launch

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. You are welcome. It really was the only part of living there I liked.

      Delete
  2. I remember the first Apollo moon landing. My eyes were glued to the TV as well. Love your story.

    Michelle K

    ReplyDelete
  3. I was in 3rd or 4th grade when they land on the moon. I try look at everything with an open heart, mind and spirit. Do I fall short....yes, I sure do.
    Stop in from Ariana Cafe

    Coffee is on

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. I was in 5th. I always had a fantasy I would be on "Are You Smarter..." and this question would come up. So, is it history if you witnessed it?

      Delete
  4. The distance can be measured in light years, or life years.

    ReplyDelete
  5. I love the song. I also remember gathering around the TV in our school summer camp and watching the first man walk on the moon. My daughter attends UCF in Orlando. They have a great school of science, but she's not majoring in that.

    http://joycelansky.blogspot.com

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. Back then, it was known as Orlando Community College. I lived about 5 miles closer to town.

      The company I am contracting with as an office right off the campus. I love telling the kids about the area before it was Mickeyfied.

      Delete
  6. So long ago and yet still so vivid in our memories. The right stuff and the stuff that dreams are made of.

    Thanks for sharing your ink with us on this subject, very interesting!

    8 points Earthling! :)

    Marvin

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. I was looking for the old Looney Tunes segment with Ralph Phillips to stick in here, but I couldn't find it.

      Delete
  7. Very interesting blog this week Christopher and I LOVE that song!!

    ReplyDelete
  8. I watched the Apollo landing on black-and-white tv -- as if yesterday -- and still love watching the skies at night. Living in Southern California and in such close proximity to JPL, space missions are still important to so many here. I believe I was about 10 when Sputnik was launched and vividly recall being out in the back yard and trying to find it orbiting above us. Wonderful post!

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. I've been camping a number of times and watched the Space Station float over head. (need to be away from lights to see).

      There is always a jolt to the imagination when watching space.

      Delete
  9. Those Apollo landings were part of my childhood, too. It was an amazing time, and you brought a flood of good memories back with this. Makes me reminisce about star gazing and planet watching with my sister. I still love to do that when I can!! :)

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. The mind races to the stars and there we dream. Or used to.

      Delete

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