Engineering outcomes

Apollo 16 Saturn V launch, 1972. I miss palm trees. (SDASM Archives)

A year ago, my parents and I went with my brother and his family to Kennedy Space Center in Cape Canaveral to see a Space X rocket take off and explore the visitor complex.

The rocket launch was a dazzling display, and seeing the space shuttle Atlantis was really cool. However, it’s the Saturn V rocket that has stuck with me the most. I simply couldn’t believe how big it was. I could visualize it in my mind, but seeing it was something else. I was truly in awe. We humans designed and built these enormous rockets, more than fifty years ago, to send people to the moon? How audacious. How improbable.

In the first few weeks of the pandemic, stuck in still-wintry Maine, I thought often of that February trip to Florida. With everything in the world shut down and wild animals roaming the empty cities, the idea that we would ever be back to launching rockets again seemed hopeless and even frivolous. It was hard to believe that, just a few weeks before, I had spent hours in such close quarters with hundreds of other people.

However, we made it through those early days of the pandemic and learned how to move forward. In fact, Space X didn’t even slow down, though the Apollo exhibit at KSC is still closed. Most amazingly of all, we have multiple vaccines. It’s a triumph of human ingenuity and innovation. Like the Apollo space program, it’s a testament to the power of putting all available resources to work to attain one goal.

Then I think about my dumb old life and wonder how this grand idea might apply to me, sitting at home eating Cheerios while greatest minds in the world are finding solutions to the world’s most challenging problems. With billions of dollars and lots of help, maybe I could make my own hopes and dreams become reality, but they seem impossible with the funds and support I have right now. How. despite endless disappointment, can my husband and I start a family? When are we going to see our nephew again? How do I find the first client for my new business? How and when can we bring back the students of the Little Middle School to indoor classes? How do I become fluent in French without being able to travel to France? And how might I make it to lunch on only one breakfast?

Though these questions are daunting, I’m in a good place right now. I’ve got energy and hope, and I’m in good health. In my work, I’m excited to help people solve problems, and I’m probably doing a better job than I was before the pandemic of keeping up with my responsibilities. It’s a good time to put some work into solving one of my more persistent challenges. Last spring, it all felt so overwhelming. Now it doesn’t. I’m so grateful for that. I can find a way to move forward with what I have.

I tend to eschew goals, preferring to focus on daily practices and consistent forward motion. But that’s not how you deliver a vaccine to a waiting world. That’s not how you put a man on the moon by the end of the 1960s, however arbitrary that timeline might be. If you have a very specific outcome you want to achieve, you might have to throw all of your weight behind it for awhile. The tighter the time frame, the more focused you have to be.

I can do that. I can’t make all of my hopes and dreams come true at once, but I can make some progress on just one. And then, after that, I can pick another. I’m willing to sacrifice a bit of ease and comfort to get to the desired result. I’ve done it before.

What keeps me from facing a big challenge and putting all my effort into resolving it? That’s easy: Fear that it won’t work. Fear that I’ll put all my energy into one thing, and it will all be for nothing.

But of course, if I don’t put my energy into something, I’m guaranteed to have nothing. And what I’ve learned from the past year, working hard just to stay afloat, is that putting your energy into something has value in and of itself, even if nothing seems to change. Just by dealing with the stresses of everyday life during the pandemic, I have developed a valuable resilience. Though I haven’t enjoyed the suffering over the past year, I’m grateful for what I have learned and how I have grown. I have come to understand that working hard for a goal is worth it even if I don’t reach it.

I won’t be recruiting scientists from all over the world. The government won’t be allocating billions of dollars to me. And that’s okay. I can still figure something out. I have my own ingenuity, a little bit of savings, and a network of people who can help. I just have to commit. I’m getting there.