10 July 2014
0751 hrs
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Good Morning, Patient Reader
36 years ago September, Voyager I left the surly bonds of
Earth and began a journey that has since profoundly changed the spirit of
man. It is now over 19 billion kilometers from us and traveling
at 17 km/sec relative to the sun. It takes
35 ½ hrs for sunlight to make a round trip to Voyager I and back. It is the first man-made object to venture
into interstellar space.
It has officially crossed the heliosheath layer of the
heliosphere, the outermost limit of our little yellow sun’s solar winds.
Aboard Voyager I is the Golden Record upon which, among
many other features, are greetings from us Earthlings in 55 languages,
alphabetically from Akkadian to Wu.
Among the many pieces of music is “Dark Was the Night, Cold Was the Ground” by Blind Willie Johnson.
Blind Willie’s stepmother threw lye in his eyes when he was
still a child. She did this in
retaliation for having been beaten by Blind Willie’s father, who found out she
has been cheating on him.
NaOH
Blind Willie died penniless from pneumonia. He had been found wrapped in wet newspaper as
he slept in his house that had partially burned down at an earlier time. His wife tried to take him to the hospital,
but he was refused treatment because he was black.
He was 48 years old, and his music just left the solar system.
He was 48 years old, and his music just left the solar system.
This is a poignant example of
the spectrum of man; the beauty of the human potential made real by music and
science and peaceful greetings from the Pale Blue Dot that is our planet- an
invitation to alien races to come and join the party . . . and the frail
failings of who we can be through abuse and ignorance and racism.
We have traveled 20+ Astronomical Units
through the harshness of a frozen vacuum and yet we still have so far to go. Shall we get on with our Evolution? Splendid!
See y'all around,
The Cunning Fennec Fox
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