This afternoon I left work at three o’clock and turned on the radio. Rather than listening to the talking heads on the radio, I flipped to the oldies station. The Steppenwolf song Born to Be Wild was on. It was the perfect song to start my adventure. “Lookin’ for adventure” is exactly my purpose, my directive… Tah Dah!!!
I stopped for gas, drove north on I-65, listened to Garth Brooks on my iPod, and found Mammoth Cave! Tah Dah!!! Honestly, I didn’t find the cave; I found the visitor’s center. While there, I saw eleven does just grazing on the grass around the parking lot. It was sunset and they were looking at me as if I was going to feed them. Boo looks at me that way around sunset as well. So I felt at home.
I checked into the hotel and found some food. I turned on the TV for a little more adventure. I looked for ESPN, not at this hotel. I looked for Food Network, denied. No Discovery Channel either. I was up a creek. I flipped till I saw a tall black man talking about the space shuttle. Tah Dah, I had stumbled upon NOVA “scienceNOW”. The man talking about the space shuttle was Neil deGrasse Tyson, astrophysicist and super geek! He was talking about the recent Hubble repair mission.
Images and faces appeared on the television screen that I recognized. See Dr. Tyson and the crew of STS-125 have visited Space Camp. Just like when I picked up a dead bird and meet Harrison Schmitt, I had the privilege of meeting four members of the STS-125 crew and Dr. Tyson. Tah Dah, that sounds like an adventure to me. Add the fact that Story Musgrave, the farm kid hired to fix the Hubble Space Telescope, loves my name, flight suit, and track six!
The point of all this, I don’t have to travel to find adventure. I have found it at Space Camp, Aviation Challenge, and all points in between. My adventure is not just meeting men and women who have ventured into space, but the guys and girls, men and women I work with each day. I am a big kid! I don’t have a whip or a light saber, but I have a brass clip on my belt loop with too many keys and an iPhone in my pocket. I get to know the next generation of leaders at Aviation Challenge and Space Camp, and now I get to run off for a few days. Tah Dah, adventure complete, sort of!