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A personal essay about black holes, Earth-sized telescopes, transcendentalism, career growth, and the quest to see the unseeable. Originally written in April 2021.
A teal arrow sits in the center of a shaded circle, indicating direction. The circle is a spotlight, meant to call my attention to my place, show me where I fit in this grand scheme of things. It expands as I zoom out, shifting perspective from local to regional. If I zoom out as far as I’m capable, my circle becomes gargantuan, swallowing Boston, making me feel both mighty and weak. If I twist my phone, the arrow shifts along with it, pointing in whatever direction is my will.
I’m lying on my back in the grass—cold, but not too cold. Just enough to cause fingers to numb slightly in fifteen minutes’ time. I hear a couple laughing as they walk somewhere behind me. A tall guy with a beard passes by, looks at me funny. A girl power walks across the courtyard, holding a plastic bag at the end of each arm. I see a jogger with a headband, unicolor in navy blue.
Couple minutes after midnight. Clear sky of stars above, three-quarter moon just over the horizon, launch tower lights dancing across the river.
I’m the lone person on the causeway, standing on the narrow stretch of rock and road crossing the Banana River between the Kennedy Space Center and the Cape Canaveral Air Force Station. It’s really just me here. Not another soul in sight. Not even headlights. White folding chairs are lined up in neat little rows in the grass and tents have been erected over empty tables awaiting crowds who will amass here in two days to view a display of fire and thunder and grandeur.
Yesterday was one of the biggest honors of my life.
I woke up, put on a suit and checked out of the Ritz Hotel at Crystal City, Washington DC, with my colleague, Nick Skytland. We had been invited to give our "Generation Y Perspectives" presentation to the wives of our nation's military top brass, as part of the military spouses' effort to understand this newest generation of service men and women to better provide family assistance programs mainly for soldiers serving overseas.
State Of The STEM Workforce in the U.S. View more presentations from Garret Fitzpatrick
A few months ago, Amanda Stiles and I were invited to speak to a group of NASA interns, young professionals, and post-docs at the STS-127 Pre-Launch Education Forum at the Kennedy Space Center on the subject of “the State of the STEM Workforce”. We were thrilled but- why us? What did we know about the State of the STEM Workforce?