I’ll tell you this, being 200 million km away from Milwaukee is not when I want to find out my father’s health is taking a turn for the worse.
I’m alone in a rock garden behind the bed and breakfast condo/townhome thing I’m staying at (and the most common type of residence on Mars, or… at least Mariner Valley). Luke is sending me messages way too frequently straight from his dome, he’s been up early and wants to take me to get a running helmet, I’ll explain that in a second. I get a text from my sister that she sent 17 minutes ago. She receives “do I need to come home right now” 17 minutes later.
Luke and I are walking across the street to an “Areo Sprint” (the nearly ubiquitous store around these parts for getting shoes and helmets) when I get the unhelpful “no, don’t worry about it, just letting you know” another 17 minutes later. Luke notices I’m very distracted, is uncharacteristically gentle - “hey boss you need a minute? Family stuff going on? I know that look”. I can’t imagine anything that wouldn’t, at this moment, elevate the sick to my stomach feeling into a full-blown panic attack, and I realize that if I’m going to get through this week, the week of return flying, and live with whatever happens, I need to intervene, mindfully, now.
I tell him I could go for a run. Running, it turns out, is the Martian pass time.
Martians are fit. This is because the most popular form of getting around is running. In 38% gravity, running is easy on the knees, and you can get going up to 40 mph. This also makes running a little dangerous. Most of the city has public running paths that resemble narrow highways, with various speed zones for all ages and abilities. You need special shoes and headgear to be legal, which I find comes in many varieties, and I manage to find a set in a brand I recognize and use on Earth. Luke thinks it’s adorable, and of course includes a jab about the superiority of the home-grown product. Today, we are running a scenic route through Candor Chasma State Park, the largest ‘nature box’ on Mars.
“Look… this place, it’s a poisonous desert. It wants to kill you.” Luke is free associating between heavy breaths.
We are bounding along at 30 mph, the slow lane. Luke is up ahead a bit. It’s incredibly easy to get the hang of, I feel like I’ve done this my entire life; I suppose I have, in my dreaming life. Candor Chasma, its planes, forests and big lake, stretches ahead for several kilometers. There are hundreds out here for their morning jogs, I see some truly impressive speed demons zip by and recede into the landscape.
“Everyone on Mars is a little sick.” This wasn’t news to me, but it’s news to hear it from Luke. He’s really letting his guard down. Or maybe he’s confident about something I’m unaware of. “Everyone has some kind of disease they’re managing, usually from childhood, that this planet gives them. But, woah” he dodges a runner making a pass in the other lane “watch it buddy! But yeah, the thing is, we’ve got medicine, great medicine, and we’ve got preventative medicine. We run. You see any fat people your whole time here?” I say I noticed some at the spaceport. I worry I might be the fattest guy on Mars. “Exactly, newcomers. They shed those pounds pretty quick.” It turns out, that the life expectancy on Mars is pretty good, would rank highly on any Earth index, and this is because despite the chronic diseases, they are all really really well managed, and the baseline health of the population is high, in large part due to running. Injuries are admittedly elevated as well, due to running. But it’s a happy trade for Martians. And at the moment, I really need this. The wind, the heart rate up, a nice long view to focus the eyes far.
And it’s fun. The first fun I’ve had this whole time. I decide to put my dad out of mind for the time being. I’ve worn myself out from rejecting the experience. My body and soul just need to be enjoying something and I’m soaking this up.
So of course, I ended up twisting an ankle. Luke carries me on his back to the ranger station where they mend me up quickly. They’ve seen everything. I text my sister while they drive me back to the closest taxi stop.
As the sun gets low it’s time for Luke to take me to Firestar Watermelon and show me around. I spend an hour in my hotel watching a chamber drama shot some 50 years ago in Gale Crater’s Red Burbank (an entertainment development complex named for Burbank California, which burned down 100 years ago but used to make movies). It’s weepy and full of references to things I don’t get, but the performances are alright, and the leading lady looks like an old crush, so I stick with it. I decide I want to look snappy for this tour; put some energy into it. As I’m laying out some options and my phone gets sniped by a text from 200 million km away - “can you send dad a video”. God dammit.
—
Firestar Watermelon is the craziest shit I’ve ever seen in my life. I fully admit to having few real points of reference, I’m not a thrill seeker and like to keep things very… twee. Earthy. But I’ve done mushrooms, and this came pretty close. We took a taxi out of the main city on a straight highway along the canyon floor. I’ve never been in a small, pressurized vehicle traveling on the Martian surface in traffic before, let alone inside the largest geologic feature the solar system has to offer. The setting sun is framed by the canyon walls which curve over the horizon. The vista is dotted with settlement lights. I get that feeling that I’ve only had once, flying into Tokyo for the first time, where it dawns on me that a place has so much more going on than my imagination ever bothered to account for, and that maybe just maybe, my taking a trip to Tokyo doesn’t make Tokyo about me. And straight ahead, like something out of Jodorowsky, is a vast industrial temple for the worship of watermelons. I’m half expecting to meet Willy Wonka.
Luke points out that I’m smiling.
Security check-in at the front desk, and then straight through the first set of doors onto the factory floor. Or… factory universe. Christ. It’s a kilometer of fractal movement receding into a white mist. Watermelons, of course, as far as the eye can see… in every direction. Arrayed across vast white Calatrava-esque ribbons in a pastoral overcast daytime, all inching along slowly, perceptibly. Millions of graceful robotic attendants giving them tender watermelon affections, pulsing like cilia across this utterly… the word divine pops into my head… this divine lattice. If watermelons invented a religion, this is their heaven. I’m feeling invaded.
I also wish dad could see this. My dad never shared my “misanthropy” as he put it. He just liked to see people doing things, working hard and using their imaginations. I feel like I need to give my worldview a better shake than that, I ask Luke “do you ever mourn what has been lost here? Like the natural spaces, the way things used to be?” Am I just finding a way to go Red and stay Green?
“There’s still plenty of that.” We’re on a catwalk a couple hundred meters up in what looks like a mangrove forest made of white plastic geodesic skin. There’s a lot more than watermelons. “Especially since we stopped our terraforming ambitions, we realized we could preserve a lot more of the natural endowment of the planet, box off what we need. At least we’re not chasing natives out of their villages and burning down thousand-acre forests to build our industrial base. Everything we do is sourced from lifeless rocks that don’t care either way. What’s left over is just… aesthetics. We like Mars. We like what it is. It’s ONLY ever been a human dream. That means we’ve never not known what we’re about.”
“Why does Mars hate hives so much?”
“We value individuality so much.” Sure, but come on. Human beings have a need for connection, a deep ancient need. Some people have a longing for intimacy that we just can’t understand, humanity is also selflessness, connection, sharing. Being one with each other.
“Right, we definitely don’t understand intimacy or belonging to one another out here on the Red Planet.” I don’t know if this is a thread I can pull very much at. For all his gregarious energy and oversharing, he has boundaries. I wish they stopped at Flo-nads, but apparently, it’s hives. He tries to be helpful. “Tomorrow I’m taking you on a trip out to see some old Mars, we’re gonna visit Muskton at Gale, and go for a night walk. If you want to talk about hives, Sierra will be happy to gab your ear off about that… on a private radio channel.” Sierra I learn is the DRI (“directly responsible individual”) overseeing all Mars - Earth logistics for Firestar Watermelon. She’s also a vociferous critic of Hives and uses her point-of-sale perch as a platform. Great, a demagogue. Can’t wait.
We end the tour with a visit to the Big Brain. The Big Brain is an air-gapped superhuman artificial intelligence that guides the pharmaceutical development cycles at the company. It’s a demigod in a magic prison powered by a small fusion reactor. I think there’s a part of Luke that isn’t just trying to win me over. I think there’s another part that isn’t sure he can and wants me to be left with at least something to be intimidated by, to leave Mars with a measure of respect. I haven’t decided how I feel about that. The Big Brain is in a comparably Small Room and there isn’t much to see. The Martian strategy of enslaving gods as opposed to the Earthly strategy of intellectually kneecapping them. I didn’t expect to be taken to see the biggest midnight zero-hour point of contention between the two worlds. I’m going with it.
“Big Brain here was the reason war didn’t happen between Antarctica and China.” I’ve heard some crazy things, and I expect crazy things from Luke, but this is definitely off the charts. “I know. You think I’m one of those.” I actually don’t know what to think, is he telling me a company secret? What is this? “I’m one of those. But only because I was there when the UN asked us to help.” “Lots of things stopped that war. History itself prevented that war.”
“Sure.”
To me, it’s like saying that Alan Turing won the war. He HELPED.
I ask if I can take a video of the watermelon floor, if we’re going back there. Luke correctly guesses that it’s for my dad, an asymmetry in insightfulness I experience with him which really gets under my skin, makes me doubt myself. He allows it.
17 minutes later - “dad really liked the video and says you look like you lost weight”.
—
I have made it through a 1-hour spacesuit certification course. It took an hour because they couldn’t find me a spacesuit that didn’t ride all the way up my business or fail to properly compress my SLIGHT spare tire. I silently endured the humiliation and after what felt like some really light instruction, I was standing outside. In a space suit. On the surface of Mars.
At night. Luke and six friends, including Sierra, are climbing onto the back of a pickup truck with some bench seating. We bounce along dreamily on the back of the truck up a winding road, exiting Gale crater. I had spent the day having a surprisingly familiar, touristy experience, restaurants, art studios, a concert in the park, a day out with Luke’s friends. Sierra and I had talked about hives, as Luke had suggested. It was a far less stupid, easy to navigate conversation than I was hoping for, and left me mostly sick and confused and quite happy to move on. They all thankfully got the hint and kept the day easy. Walking, talking, eating, bar crawl.
The last lights of the Gale-Muskton metro area disappear behind Mount Sharp. They all tap their helmets and make a peace sign at the sky. What’s that about? “Ritual. Curiosity crossed the road back there.” I don’t know what that means, but I nod anyway.
So, I turn my attention to the night sky. It’s just like the observation deck in the hotel, the entire milky way frozen perfectly in the sky. All lights go off completely, including the truck, which continues along at a good clip deep into the pitch-black terrain. Luke notices me startled, reminds me that the truck can see fine. Back to the night sky. I think of my dad and sister and spend a long time trying to spot Earth. Then I remember Earth is sunward and feel a deep sadness. It’s the most incredibly lonely feeling. I’m tired of feeling like a foreigner. I want to go home.
Luke puts an arm around my shoulder. “It’s a lot, man.”
I blink away a tear.
We walk into the desert, the display on our helmets is un-intrusive and doesn’t break our night vision, just a simple hiking and foot placement guide for safety. We aren’t going far, there’s a small crater this group of friends likes to visit, about the size of a swimming pool, a nice little bowl for laying down in. Thermal blankets are laid out. A little wheeled robot with extra air parks itself some sensible distance away. Tubes are run, hooked up. Soon, we’re all laying, propped up on our backpacks. In a natural, private planetarium theater.
I cling to the side of the planet, floating through the Milky Way.
As the faint blue of dawn creeps in, satellites become visible. Space traffic begins to illuminate slowly. I look around at the crater. A clean white frost has collected in the middle. I turn on my side and look at a rock.
It’s just a rock.
Eventually, everyone begins quietly gathering blankets and heading back. We drive in silence as the morning rolls in, passing a solar farm that was completely invisible at night. I get a good look at the dramatic landscape I missed when it was pitch, the entire mini canyon we passed through. Soon, we’ve passed through all the wickets of increasing degrees of civilization and we’re back near Gale North town hall, school kids in uniforms are being goaded into lines to board the next shuttle bus. Two Kenyan guys in hard hats are laughing to the point of tears over absolutely amazing cappuccino and croissants. I’m hungry.
Sierra gives me the contact to a Mariner Valley doctor for a second opinion on my dad. She does so with tenderness and tact, it’s so damn nice I want to weep.
—
The return to Earth happens a couple days later. I’ve decided I just don’t like space travel. But this time, I manage. I’m not so helpless. I feel motivated to at least handle it myself, which I’m proud to say I did. Luke stayed on Mars. Another week aboard a hotel. Before I know it, I’m standing outside Uncle Wolfie’s on Vine waiting to see my girlfriend.
I don’t know what’s changed in me, something certainly has. I can’t imagine it wouldn’t. I don’t know that my commitments have changed. I still believe in a lot of the same things. But… I believe them differently. It’ll probably take me a very long time to process that. For now, I notice I don’t think of it as space anymore. It’s Mariner Valley, it’s Gale, it’s the vending machine with the coffee I liked so much. It’s a bunch of faces. It's a magical watermelon farm. It’s Big Brain. It’s a small crater where I was… reborn, I guess. Maybe these will slowly compress themselves into a vague overall category again, the way Tokyo did. But it will be a different thing.
One is simply left changed by travel. And for me, the world grew. What people are and can be grew.