Δαφνη Ευτυχια Αρθουρος

I would just like to state for the record that getting rained on while standing inside my own house is not on my list of favourite things.

(I knew the roof was getting old and would need to be re-covered "soonish", but I thought I had another couple of years to deal with it. There was no sign of leakage at all until about an hour ago, but right now there's a puddle on the 3rd floor that's dripping down onto the 2nd floor. I just rearranged boxes so I could put something up there to catch the drip from the roof. Yesterday evening the 3rd floor ceiling looked fine. And no, I have no idea how I'm going to pay for this. I'll ask Mom whether she can afford to help out yet again...)

And I thought I had problems.

I just wandered past the bedroom with the television in it, and caught a news report: the space shuttle Columbia, which was gliding in for a landing and was due 15 minutes ago, has vanished from radar and is out of radio contact.

Suddenly I feel very cold.

(Note that on reentry, the shuttle has no use of its engines, and "the glide path of a polished brick".)

silmaril posted a song by Bob Esty of Clam Chowder. I'd like to suggest "Keep the Dream Alive", by Stephen Savitzky, as well. Someone already wondered aloud on rec.music.filk how long it'll be before someone adds a Columbia verse to it.

The song going through my head is "Hope Eyrie", by Leslie Fish, mostly because that's the one I already know the melody for. Even though it celebrates a highlight instead of lamenting a tragedy, something about the gritty determination of it feels apropriate for today.

Performing at a festive event (Winterfest) this evening is going to feel pretty darned strange. Maybe there'll be an apropriate spot to slip "Lamento di Tristano" into the set list, if enough of the band feels solid on that tune.

Oh [expletive], here come the tears.

I just said this in a comment to someone else's journal, but I feel like putting it where more of my friends will see it...

I cried when I saw the photos of the first untethered spacewalk: that was the day I discovered that envy could physically hurt. I wanted so badly to be there, floating, not attached to the ground, not attached to a ship, however briefly. I don't recall off the top of my head whether that was before or after the Challenger explosion.

When I heard about Challenger, I was in a car with three co-workers. Someone asked, "If they offered you a seat on the next shuttle mission, would you take it?" At least one person -- I think it was two or maybe all three -- said no way. I said, "I'd be scared shitless, but I'd still go. I want space that badly."

I'd still go. And you know what? The question's even easier to answer today than it was then.

Somebody with more dreams than self-preservation instinct has built a replica of the Wright Flyer and plans to fly it on the 100th anniversary of that first powered flight, this coming December. I want to be there. I understand that person.

Today even more than most days.

butterfluff reminded me of this song that I'd forggotten about, so I did a web search for it, and found it in an archive of a BBS (scroll down about 200 lines):

And just below it was:

I was expecting lots of songs or URLs of songs to be posted today; somehow I didn't realize I was going to wind up posting so many myself. What I should really do is write something, but when I do, it'll probably be an instrumental.