Dark side of the moon

In 1968 the Apollo 8 mission put humans into a lunar orbit for the first time. They spun around the moon 10 times then come home! On every lap they disappeared out of possible human contact for forty minutes, beyond radio contact around the far side of the moon. I imagine Mission Control held their psychological breath every time until they heard the astronaut’s voices again.


Flying dark, expecting to connect back to the stream of human history. Hoping nothing went wrong, particularly during that 40 minutes. A leap of confidence every time, trusting there was a safe landing on the other side.




At basketball today the two courts were separated by the giant drop down curtain which keeps the basketballs out of the badminton games. It’s not usually like this. Most Sunday mornings the 7 year olds play basketball on the close court and the 9 year olds on the far one. Our 3 year old usually runs big laps of both. We watch from the aluminium benches next to the 7 year old game. We stay in radio contact with our little Apollo 8 as she orbits the hall.


Today the curtain was down. Today she went dark on the far side of moon, 2 minutes later she’d emerge back into view, puffing and flapping across the timber floor, side stepping stray basketballs. It was a leap of confidence every time. 2 minutes of mystery on her lap of the hall.


You don’t always land a big leap. Most leaps you know where you’d like to land, usually somewhere different and good, but it’s not guaranteed. I suppose that is part of the value.

Regardless, it seems important to keep going for it. To keep leaping across the dark, reaching for a good landing.