I just know there’s a jet pack with my name on it.
I’ve been thinking that thought for 40 years.
The space program, the only program on TV when I was a kid in 1969, promised me, promised everyone, a jet pack. You know, something you could strap to your back and ride the skies to work, or the corner store, or the playground. The only other thing I wanted out of the space program was glass after glass of yummy Tang. I drank the Tang. I’m still waiting to fly.
It tells me something about promises. And expectations. And all those articles in my Dad’s Popular Mechanics magazines that insisted I could do it myself. I could build my own jet pack.
But I sometimes wonder if flight is necessary. If it will be as pleasant as I dream it is. Or maybe it would be better to soar with the mind’s own wind rather than scream, jet-fuelled, across the sky.
It doesn’t matter. What matters is that I don’t allow myself to rest here.
Promises won’t get me where I need to be. Most promises are lies that haven’t been spoken. And most expectations are constructed of imagined promise and glasses of Tang.
Popular Mechanics told me everything I needed to know about these things. It said, I had to do it myself.
-Meghan
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"Most promises are lies that haven’t been spoken."
ReplyDeleteThis line disturbs me, Meghan. We're only as good as our word.
I don't threaten actions I won't follow-through on -- put that in the positive and I don't make promises I can't keep. I realize not everyone lives that way; the trick is to make good friendships with the people who do and not depend seriously on people who don't. Make sense? :)
Yeah. I know. When I wrote that I was thinking mostly of the promises made to us by governments. And yes, it is most definitely the cynical view. It's more of a warning sign in my life, rather than a truth with a capital 'T'. Thanks for reminding me.
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