Until I got married, I was only marginally interested in astronomy and the things that NASA were doing. However, I married an astronomy buff, which means that I automatically had to obtain more knowledge than the basics that I learned in college. Since that time, I have learned more about space than I had ever though I would.

We have watched the last few shuttle missions on TV and, since Time Warner doesn’t carry NASA TV, we watched the live feed from NASA TV online. Though many people find the shuttle take offs and landings to be a bit boring, I’ve found myself really getting into it and wanting to learn more. I’ve been fortunate enough to watch the shuttle missions with someone who is enthusiastic about the space program and who explains things to me without talking down to me.

When you learn the little things that make the shuttle work, it makes it even more interesting to someone who doesn’t know a lot about the science behind it. In high school and college, I only took the cursory classes that introduce you to astronomy. So, I never learned things like it takes about twenty minutes for the tiles to cool off after landing before anyone can even think about touching them or that the gases vented from the top, rear of the shuttle after landing are highly toxic, which is why the support vehicles have to wait until it’s safe to approach the shuttle.

If I had learned some more of these things, I probably would have been more interested in what NASA was doing, but the educational system of the United States doesn’t require much more than the basics. Even in the 1980s, my science teachers didn’t know much and they didn’t seem to care to know many more details than what the news reports told us. It was my high school social studies teacher who arranged to have the TV brought to our study hall so that we could see the Challenger take off. Yes, we all know how that ended but, the fact is, that she knew the importance of space exploration and she was able to answer most of our questions.

So, Discovery landed safely and I found myself shocked that more than two hours went by before I found myself starting to tire of seeing all things Discovery. This, however, had more to do with the fact that, about twenty minutes after landing, NASA TV showed about ten different angles of the shuttle landing. That was boring. Fortunately, just when I had enough of seeing yet another angle of the same damned thing, they returned to live shots.

I got to see the support vehicles and crew surrounding the shuttle, carefully inspecting it. I saw the crew leave the shuttle as well and I wasn’t bored. After nearly three and a half hours, NASA’s coverage ended and we went on with the rest of our evening.

The thing that struck me the most was that this sort of thing isn’t carried by the news. They show the shuttle landing and will occasionally show the crew exiting the shuttle but that’s about it. Most of the time, this isn’t even live.  It’s taped and just shown as a highlight during the news.

After watching Discovery, and Atlantis a few months ago, I began to understand why so many Americans just don’t care about NASA, the space program or the shuttle missions. We get so little information about what is happening and why that people are disinterested. If something doesn’t hold our attention for more than five minutes, then it must suck.

We’ve become so accustomed to the “give it to me now” attitude of America that we have lost the ability to appreciate the small details and subtle nuances that make the shuttle program what it is. It’s a shame too. If the news would cover a little bit more or give out some of the “well I’ll be damned” type of facts, Americans might just find themselves wanting to know what’s happening with NASA and how things are going. It’s wishful thinking, I know, but, just imagine what could happen if people actually stopped being self-involved for a few minutes and paid attention to what’s going on at NASA, they’d be amazed at the advancements the space program has achieved to make all of our lives better.