When I was a kid, I loved watching “The Jetsons,” a cartoon about a family set in the space-age future.
George and Jane Jetson had a futuristic house where you pushed a button to make dinner, you stood on a moving sidewalk while robots showered you, dried you off and dressed you and you walked the dog, Astro, by standing on a treadmill outside the house.
I particularly like George’s flying car. I don’t know in what year “The Jetsons” was set, but my 5-year-old brain figured by the year 2019 we would certainly have flying cars and I could zip around wherever I wanted to go without ever sitting in traffic again in my life. And when I got to my destination, it would fold up into a briefcase.
Alas, we don’t yet have flying cars and I spend an inordinate amount of time sitting still on interstate highways in this county. Unfortunately, I don’t see flying cars any time soon. We’ve ended the space shuttle program and now we must rely on other countries like Russia, once our sworn space enemy, if we are going to send astronauts into space. So, succinctly, America isn’t really exploring space anymore.
This is distressing for several reasons. First, space is truly the final frontier and we should be pushing to learn and explore more about the unknown. It’s what humankind has done throughout its history.
You remember Christopher Columbus, of course. He set sail in 1492 to prove to people that the world was round, not flat.
“The Earth, she’s round. Like a meatball,” he’s famously quoted as saying.
When he sailed off into the horizon and didn’t fall of the edge, he was proven right. But what if he didn’t have the natural curiosity that comes with being an explorer.
“Who cares if the world is flat or round? Doesn’t affect me,” he might have said to his friends as they sat around the bar watching football.
“But Chris, Queen Isabella is willing to give us three ships and enough money to fund the trip.”
“Well, if she thinks it’s such a hot idea, she can take the trip herself. Personally, I think she’s a nut. Hey, bartender, bring me another Bud Light.”
Now the U.S. has chosen to stay out of space and my flying car will have to wait.
And I’ve just thought of another thing I’d like to see the space-age bring me – the transporter from Star Trek.
Think about it. You could just stand on the transporter and have yourself beamed wherever in the world you wanted to, which would make traveling to Georgia football games a snap.
You could decide on a whim to have lunch in Paris, and before you have time for second thoughts, Scotty – I don’t know what the transporter operator’s name will be, but you know we are all going to call him Scotty – has you sitting at a quaint sidewalk café in France.
The folks on “Bewitched,” another show that I liked as a kid, used to pop from place to place a lot, too. But they didn’t use a transporter. Endora would wave her arms a few times and – poof! – she and Sam would be joining us at the café.
But I figure that no amount of scientific exploration is going to allow me to get to Paris by waving my arms, so the next move is up to NASA.
I really want my Jetsons car.
