When I was a kid, my brother and I both devoured science fiction paperbacks that our uncle Lou would bring us. Asimov, Heinlein, Bradbury were the mainstays. Then when I got a little older I discovered LeGuin, James Tiptree Jr. and the more philosophical side of SciFi.<\/p>\n
I can still remember my first time reading Bradbury’s R is for Rocket<\/i> and S is for Space<\/i>, and Heinlein’s The Menace from Earth<\/i> and The Green Hills of Earth<\/i>. And of course Asimov. The Foundation<\/i> trilogy and all those robot stories filled my head with wonder.<\/p>\n
So to me, amidst all the weird things that grownups were actually up to — fighting pointless wars, assassinating any inspiring leader with a dream, breaking into hotels to subvert democracy — one thing stood out. Grownups went to the moon and walked on it.<\/p>\n
One day the TV was just showing space fantasies like Star Trek<\/i> and Lost in Space<\/i>. Then suddenly it was showing the real life version of the science fiction dreams of my childhood.<\/p>\n
When I was a kid, real-life grownups were capable of levels of collective idiocy that no child can ever comprehend, and sadly, they still are. Yet for one day those grownups achieved a level of grace that allowed children around the world to believe that a better and nobler world is possible.<\/p>\n
All these years later, I still believe it. Just maybe, I have that first footstep on the moon to thank.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
When I was a kid, my brother and I both devoured science fiction paperbacks that our uncle Lou would bring us. Asimov, Heinlein, Bradbury were the mainstays. Then when I got a little older I discovered LeGuin, James Tiptree Jr. and the more philosophical side of SciFi. I can still remember my first time reading … Continue reading “50th Anniversary”<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":[],"categories":[1],"tags":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"http:\/\/blog.kenperlin.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/21344"}],"collection":[{"href":"http:\/\/blog.kenperlin.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"http:\/\/blog.kenperlin.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/blog.kenperlin.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/blog.kenperlin.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=21344"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"http:\/\/blog.kenperlin.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/21344\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":21345,"href":"http:\/\/blog.kenperlin.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/21344\/revisions\/21345"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"http:\/\/blog.kenperlin.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=21344"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/blog.kenperlin.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=21344"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/blog.kenperlin.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=21344"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}