Baruch Dayan Emet. [1] Dammit.

Gegarin was the first, back in 1961
When like Icarus, undaunted, he climbed to reach the sun...

A few days ago, I was reflecting on Challenger and had started to compose an entry in my head. But this past week was a little hectic and I never got the words down in bits. Now, instead, I will write a slightly different entry.

I am old enough to remember the first landing on the moon, but I wasn't old enough at the time to understand what the big deal was. (I was 5 going on 6.) My formative years, educationally-speaking, fell during that decade or so when the space program was no longer "current events" but was not yet "history". Neither my parents nor my small circle of friends followed the space program, so I was pretty unaware until, probably, sometime in college. I heard a lot of space history for the first time from the filk tape "Minus Ten and Counting", which prompted me to go out and learn more. Now that I think about it, I have never properly thanked Julia Ecklar and Leslie Fish for that.

I remember the morning of Challenger quite clearly. I knew there was a launch coming up, but had lost track of the schedule. And I wasn't so hard-core that I watched (or listened to) launches live anyway. I caught them on the news when I could, or read about them in the paper. I was at work that morning, and I had a cubicle, not an office, so I wouldn't have had the radio on anyway.

Scott walked out of his office into my cubicle and said "It blew up". I thought he was talking about some code I had handed over to him. I said "on what? I ran the test suite". And he said no, not that, and I should come into his office and listen to the radio. And I did.

I didn't actually see the footage until later that night. They were playing it over and over, and I sat there stunned. And several of us said that this was probably the end of the manned space program, even though these had hardly been the first deaths. They were the first deaths that we had witnessed, as opposed to reading about, though, and it made an impact.

That was 17 years ago, and it didn't kill the space program, though clearly that program hasn't been a major priority. But it's been there, and that's important to me. I have hopes that some day people will actually leave this planet for more than a few days or weeks or months. I desperately hope that we do a better custodial job on the next planet we get our hands on, too.

Shuttle trips have become fairly routine. There have been enough that I guess I got complacent about it, the way I do about driving a car. I didn't even realize that today was the day they were coming back.

Today was Shabbat. I didn't hear the news. Tonight I read my email and saw a message from someone in the local SF club saying something like "shall we plan a memorial after this week's meeting?". Memorial? What the heck was he talking about. I figured maybe some SF author had died. I bopped over to CNN to see if I could tease it out.

Damn. How did that happen? My heart goes out to the victims. Seven, like before. A first, like before -- last time a teacher, this time an Israeli.

I feel mildly guilty that my heart aches a little bit more for those seven (and their families) than it does for many of the truly innocent, unexpected deaths that happen around the world every day -- earthquakes, famines, wars, disease. Astronauts, at least, know they're going into danger; they're taking a chance. The folks who die in brushfires or monsoons or tornados, or in skyscrapers in New York, weren't doing anything risky or out of the ordinary. I should have more sympathy for them than for astronauts. But I don't, somehow, though I am not uncaring. Call it a character flaw, I guess.

I suspect that this is a setback, not an end, to the space program. But I do wonder how many setbacks it can withstand before an impatient public calls to shut it down and spend the money elsewhere. I wonder if private enterprise will be positioned to take up the slack any time soon.

[1] Literally, "praised is the true judge" -- said upon hearing of someone's death. Meaning: God had His reasons, even if we can't comprehend them.

Deirdre's memorial service (Friday)

Friday afternoon was the memorial service for Deirdre. I didn't really know what to expect, particularly with timing. It was scheduled for 3:30 at CMU; Shabbat officially started at 5:19. I figured I could do this, and left work a bit after 3. Found parking right away, at a meter, and got there in plenty of time.

The service was lovely. A lot of people from a lot of different points in Deirdre's life spoke. I learned a lot of things that I hadn't known about her. One of the most touching moments, for me, actually came from one of her students, when he said that because of her teaching he had gone into linguistics. Deirdre had a lot of influence in a lot of lives, and this was a small case where it was more direct than usual. More broadly, she was full of fun and laughter and insight, and I will miss her.

I saw but didn't get to talk to Larry before things got started. I also saw and briefly spoke with assorted other people. The formal part of the gathering got started late and ran until a bit after 5 (I think 5:10 or so). I didn't want to leave during that part; I couldn't do that to Larry, and would sacrifice some Shabbat correctness if necessary to not be rude to him. After the formal part I talked with Larry, said "hi - bye" to several other people I had wanted to talk to, and left. (I hope they understood, but some probably thought I was being rude to run off right away.) I got home, turned on the oven, shoved the casserole into it from the fridge (I did all prep Thursday), and lit candles at 5:35, which was, technically, 2 minutes before sundown and so good enough. (I've never pushed the 18 minutes so far before.) I had set all the lights, the electric blanket, and the crock pot in the morning, just in case things were tight.

In retrospect, I should have done things differently. I should have asked someone for a ride from Squirrel Hill to the memorial and gone home from work to start food and the like. (Or just planned on cold food for one meal, even, so all I would have had to do was drop my car off.) Once at CMU, I would not have been pressed for time, and I could have stayed as long as seemed appropriate. That would have been the correct thing to do. I wish I had thought of it before it was too late!

(I briefly considered just staying and picking up my car after Shabbat. If I thought that the worst I would get would be a ticket I would have done it, but I wasn't sure that CMU wouldn't tow me or boot me or something for being at an unpaid meter for more than a day. They've done stuff like that to people in the past.)