Red sky on the morning of Aug. 29 near Cape Canaveral before the scrubbed Artemis launch.
On Aug. 29, a rainbow appeared on the eastern horizon of the Atlantic minutes after the Artemis launch was postponed.
Jeri Theunissen, Jan Risher and Mary Farmer-Kaiser in a field in Vermilion Parish watching for meteors.
While volunteering to make the world a better place is important, the value of recognizing and pursuing the big and small things that inspire us, or the quirky things that feed our spirits, should not be underrated either.
Such pursuits don't have to be complicated. For example, I love a good meteor shower — surely everyone does, right? When I heard we were supposed to have a big meteor shower one night back in November 2019, I convinced two friends to pack thermoses full of hot chocolate, load up blankets galore and head to the country. We made our getaway after the rest of our families had gone to bed — and on a weeknight.
It was one of the coldest nights Louisiana has seen (remember that cold spell in November 2019 that killed all the citrus?) Nonetheless, the three of us built a giant pallet on a flatbed trailer in a field in the middle of the boondocks of Vermilion Parish. For more than three hours, we laid, snuggled in our sleeping bags, under the dark sky, occasionally sitting up to drink the aforementioned hot chocolate. We laughed. We shared stories. We may have shed a tear or two. All in all, the cold and the night in general were invigorating despite no grand meteor streaking across the sky that night.
Jeri Theunissen, Jan Risher and Mary Farmer-Kaiser in a field in Vermilion Parish watching for meteors.
We think we saw one tiny one that fell about an inch. As so often happens in cases like this, the lack of meteors didn't matter. The experience broke the monotony of life, and we had a great time.
During the course of the evening, we individually confessed that each of us had considered cancelling. Yet, more than two years later, we all three are glad we didn't and remain grateful for the experience. We remember it in vivid detail (as compared to our likely remembering little from just another evening at home). As my husband said after his and our daughter's recent efforts to see the Aug. 29 Artemis rocket launch, "We didn't see it, but we would never see it if we didn't try. There's always the possibility of it not happening, but there's also the chance that it might."
His attitude goes a long way in explaining why we've managed 28 years of marriage. It also reminded me that my efforts to see the natural marvels of space are small potatoes compared to the lengths they went to in trying to see the Artemis launch.
Red sky on the morning of Aug. 29 near Cape Canaveral before the scrubbed Artemis launch.
They drove all the way to Cape Canaveral, got an overpriced hotel room, bought tickets for a boat they met in the wee hours of the morning. Then, they went a couple miles out into the Atlantic and waited. First, the launch was delayed. Then, after a couple of hours bobbing around in the Atlantic, the launch was scrubbed for that day. He sent me a text with a photo attached the moment after the launch was cancelled. It said, "Just got scrubbed. No launch today, but we got a rainbow."
On Aug. 29, a rainbow appeared on the eastern horizon of the Atlantic minutes after the Artemis launch was postponed.
Our 25-year-old daughter was not nearly as zen about the situation as her father. Truth be told, I'm not sure he wouldn't have been at 25 either. Even still, I believe she will grow to appreciate the experience she shared with her dad, launch or no launch.
In considering the value of chasing the things that inspire us or pique our interests, I believe acknowledging the energy required to say, "Hey, let's do this," and then making the plans and taking the journey, long or short, is not to be underestimated.
These adventures don't have to be elaborate or expensive to be memorable and, to bring things back around, they don't have to be about our selfish interests either. Whether it's a night on the levee moon dancing, volunteering to read to a child, mentoring a teen or adopting an extra grandmother, taking that initial step can be heartening and lead to marvelous places you don't expect to go.
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