“If you begin to think you're something you're not,
you're looking in the wrong mirror.” - Eugene Cernan
I have been watching the Mark Craig directed documentary, Last Man on the Moon (2014). It is great
educational entertainment for an Apollo junkie like me. It describes the career
path of Eugene (Gene) Cernan as he was transformed from a Navy aircraft carrier,
jet pilot to an astronaut during the heyday of lunar exploration from the time
of the Gemini missions and right up to the last Apollo mission. The title of
the movie comes from the fact that Cernan is the last person to have stood on
the surface of the moon which was on December 14, 1972, more than 42 years ago.
Cernan is fascinating. He is both ordinary and extraordinary.
He is an ordinary citizen with a Texas Longhorn cattle ranch who enjoys
watching a good Texas rodeo. He is an outspoken proponent of space exploration
who believes that America has lost something important by not returning to the
moon since he last set foot there.
“After Apollo 17, America stopped
looking towards the next horizon. The United States had become a space-faring
nation, but threw it away. We have sacrificed space exploration for space
exploitation, which is interesting but scarcely visionary.”
He believes that humanity as a whole needs a greater degree
of curiosity and pioneering ambition. He suggests that we need to ask questions
about who we are and our place in the universe.
“Curiosity is the essence of human
existence. 'Who are we? Where are we? Where do we come from? Where are we
going?'... I don't know. I don't have any answers to those questions. I don't
know what's over there around the corner. But I want to find out.”
I may be a bit of a product
of my own generation (I was 9 years old when Apollo 11 landed on the moon) but
I tend to agree with Cernan. We do need more pioneering spirit; we do need more
curiosity; we should be looking toward the next horizon. Ordinary people can do
extraordinary things when the horizon is just one goal before reaching toward
the next goal. Horizon after horizon after horizon will allow anyone to
encircle the earth. Gene Cernan is also very practical and does not see himself
as special. He says that, “People try to typecast astronauts as heroic and
superhuman. We're only human beings.” May we and all of humanity be as ordinary
as Gene Cernan.