Perseverance

Tap. Tap.

"Hi. Is this working....Wow," I heard loudly, as I heard my voice travel away from the microphone in front of me to the very back of the audience. I stared into the sea of faces in front of me, yet all I could see was eyes. Eyes boring deep into my soul, yet also through me, as if I wasn't even there. I was half tempted to turn around as if there was something more interesting behind me. Surely all these people hadn't just shown up to hear me... Had they?

Hi, I'm Brooke. Maybe I should start from the beginning of my story, that way you can understand everything. Start to finish. Okay. I'm 25 and my whole life, as long as I can remember at least, I've been obsessed with science. At the age of 7, I conducted an experiment on worms in my backyard. I started with 4 different worms and I cut each of them up into different sizes and waited to see which ones grew back the fastest. Don't be so alarmed! Worms are actually planarians, so they are able to regenerate from very small fragments as long as they have all the organs necessary to survive in the fragments. One worm can actually be cut up and survive as multiple different worms. Crazy right? Anyways, I'm getting sidetracked. Back to my story. So I graduated college at Harvard with a Ph.D in Astronomy and in Engineering, which I think is pretty cool. Shorty after, I applied to N.A.S.A and got a job as an engineer working on their new space shuttle, Space Expedition X. This is really where my story begins. After 3 long years of trial and error, my team finally finished the building and engineering Space Expedition X. First in the entire world to be able to reach the speed of light, and I was a part of the team that did that. Granted, I wasn't the one that did all the mathematics required to determine the exact right slope of the wings or down to the decimal point how narrow the nose should be, but I was still an active member of the team. I guess I'm always one to downplay how much of an asset I am, because no sooner had we finished the project that my boss was asking me if I'd be willing to be one of the first women to travel in space at the speed of light. When I tell you I wasn't expecting that, I mean I really wasn't expecting that. When I started working for N.A.S.A, I spent hours of my free time looking at the satellite images of stars and of different constellations, calculating the distance each and every star was from the exact spot I was sitting. This was unusual for someone in my career. Most of my colleagues would go and watch the astronauts preparing to begin a new adventure on the other side of the atmosphere. They could only dream of being able to wander outside this Earth and see everything this galaxy had to offer. Me? I was fine right where I was in my chair, gazing at the stars through my computer screen. So you can imagine my surprise when I was the one asked to be the technical engineer on Space Expedition X. Now obviously I said yes, otherwise I wouldn't be where I am today, telling you this story. Now you may think that I made history because I was the first woman to travel at the speed of light in space, and for that you are gravely mistaken. As many of you may know, 5 people boarded Space Expedition X on June 24th, 2027; of these 5 people, myself included, there were three trained astronauts and two technical engineers. Our mission was simple. We would exit this stratosphere and travel to Proxima Centauri b, which is 4.22 light years from Earth. For those of you who don't quite understand that, let me simplify that for you. Space Expedition X is able to travel at the speed of light, which is 299,792,458 m/s. Now in one year, light travels 9.4607 × 10¹² km, nearly 6 trillion miles. That distance represents a light year. So, it would take us an estimated 4.22 years to reach Proxima Centauri b, and 4.22 years to return, a total of about 8.5 years. Now right of the bat, that seems like an awfully long time to spend in space, longer than any space expedition ever. That was part of our engineering though you see, we had to figure out how the space shuttle would be able to hold enough food and water for 5 people to survive for over 8 years. Thankfully, we got our numbers right. Incase you were wondering, we needed about 12,000 gallons of water in order for each of us to get the daily recommended value of 12 cups. Of course, it is routine to provide extra for any expidition incase something goes wrong. Now, as most of you already know, our expedition did not last 8 years. My crew ended up stranded, 1 light year away from Earth. The engine failed one day while we were sleeping and to our horror, the shuttle stopped moving. Communication with N.A.S.A headquarters was lost, and we were all alone, floating through an empty vacuum. With no way to communicate with anyone else and get the help we so desperately needed, it was up to Dr. Aaron Burke and I to, the only two people who knew how to shuttle was built, to try and save our asses and get us safely home to Earth. Now time in space works funny, you can never really know what time it is. I'll tell you, Aaron and I worked relentlessly to try and fix the engine. Based on how we determined days to pass in space, we figured we had been stuck in space for 5 years at most. At the end of those 5 years, we finally got the engine to turn and and run properly, and we were able to return home to Earth. Keep in mind, we still had to travel back to Earth, which was 1 light year away. Nobody on Earth knew what had happened to us, and everyone assumed us dead. In September of 2036, we returned home. 9 years later. So much for the 5 years we thought we had been gone. Now that is why I made history. I made history for being one of five people to be stuck in space, presumed dead, and to have survived. I survived.

"So that is why I am here today, giving you a speech on perseverance. No matter how hard you want to give up, do not give up. My family thought I was, they had almost moved on when all of the sudden, I was alive. Do you want to know the first thing my dad said to me when he saw me? He said, 'Deep down I knew you were still alive. You've always been stubborn one. A fighter.' Be a fighter, because you never know what day will be your last... or what one won't." I finished my speech with a smile, the whole crowed erupted with applause and cheers, waving there hands furiously through the air and music began to play in the background. I was escorted of the stage by none other than the President of the United States. I had never planned to make history, but here I was.