LJ Idol Topic #10: Icarus

[the_vernacular]

Dear Sarah,

Hello. My name is Vicki and I am nine years old. It is nice to meet you. We are all very eggs  exited excited that Mrs. M. is going into space.  Of course we are all sad that Mrs. I. is not going with her but Mrs. I said she likes Mrs. M. a lot.  We are also very happy that Mrs. M agreed to let us be pen pals.

Let me tell you a

Comments

[basric]

Very well done. It was a terrible disaster, but every astronaut that was asked if they would go up on the net, everyone aid yes. That included the scientist and other nonmilitary candidates.

An excellent entry. Presentation is everything an your rocked.

[the_vernacular]

I had been waffling between writing about the Challenger or writing about the Wright Brothers, and then, suddenly, in the middle of reading up on the specific Wright Brothers event that I was thinking about writing about, I remembered writing these letters to Mrs. McAuliffe's students, and I thought, hey! That's probably something that's unique to my experience.

Some of it is fictionalized just because I was very young, and I don't really remember how many letters we wrote or all the content of them, so I filled in the spots with other elementary school memories.

I would go up in an instant, I think! It's such an amazing opportunity.

[creature_girl08]

I sat here crying as those memories came flooding back at me. Wonderful entry. And yay, I figured out how to leave a comment. Go me,

[the_vernacular]

Hooray, thank you for reading and thank you for your comment. It made me remember a lot of the confusion of that moment, when we went from excitement and awe at the majesty of our own ingenuity to terror and dismay and loss.

[mstrobel]

Wow. I was reading that with such a sense of doom, knowing of course what was to happen. I love the way you put it together - and was quite amazed to learn it was actually true, not a fictional account. I was a bit too young to recall the actual disaster, though I do have a very vague memory of it, but three years after it, when I was 7, we studied it in library class and it's one of those things which has haunted me ever since.

[the_vernacular]

It's a bit fictionalized just because I don't remember all the content of the letters, or how many letters there were, but the content I don't remember was filled in with other memories from my childhood.

It was a really haunting experience and I think a really important one in my childhood. We were told that this thing, this wonderful thing was going to happen and how exciting it would be and how space exploration was going to be something we would all do in the future, and I think every kid in my class wanted to be an astronaut. And then the thing didn't happen, and there was an explosion and people died. I think it was the first time in my life that that kind of absolute disappointment, that went beyond the kind of childish disappointment of not getting the toy I wanted, that was all-pervasive and touched all of the world as I knew it, struck.

[mstrobel]

But a fictionalised account of something that happened, packs more punch than had you made this up from scratch.

I can't imagine it, to be honest - having this exciting thing being all built up and then having it end how it did, at that age. I can't think of anything similar in my life.

[the_vernacular]

Oh and thank you of course for your kind comment.

[wyliekat]

This gave me a massive case of goosebumps. How terrible it all must have been. I remember it happening, but I was so much more remote from it all.

[the_vernacular]

I'm sorry! I somehow missed your comment when I was replying to people!

I always feel a little bad when people say things like that writing gave them goosebumps. I mean, I feel good, I'm delighted that you thought it was effective writing, but there's also that "oh no! I didn't mean to make anyone feel bad," voice in the back of my head.

I was pretty remote from it, too. Pen pals were just these fun things where letters appeared for you from people you would never meet. i didn't really feel a very close connection to my pen pal, which is sort of sad now.

[wyliekat]

I guess when something is far enough removed, you forget how many people it impacted. However minor this exchange was in the larger scheme of things, it was just sad to see the children you were getting excited about something that was about to become a terrible tragedy.

[the_vernacular]

Yeah, I think that's what a lot of it was, this got so built up in our heads as this exciting happy thing to look forward to and then the rug got pulled out from under us.

I do think it was a touchstone moment at least for Americans of that era.

[pricelessone]

Wow. This is just chilling and so personal. I was only 4 years old when this happened, so I have no firsthand memories of it. The first time I remember hearing about it at all was eight years later when a fellow student gave a speech about it in middle school. What a horrible loss for those students she taught, and how close you were to it all.

[the_vernacular]

I didn't even really understand it when it happened; it wasn't something sad so much as shocking-- this thing that everyone was so certain of just didn't happen and people were dead. I still remember sitting in the auditorium watching on the television and not understanding that the shuttle hadn't gone into space like it was supposed to.