Space

It must be clear by now that my ideas about how something is going to go before it happens rarely align with how it actually goes. Maybe someday I’ll realize that myself.

Tim wanted to watch Interstellar this weekend. He’s a space-movie fan, someone who watches 2001 Space Odyssey every time it’s on. When he watches 2001, I take a nap. It’s our agreement. He doesn’t have to watch musicals with me, and I don’t have to watch space movies with him.

This weekend, with the weather so chilly, I thought it would be nice if we snuggled into bed under my electric blanket while he watched the space movie and I read a book. Perfect way to spend a cool Saturday evening.

But I never read the book. I didn’t even open it.

I figure everyone has watched Interstellar, so I’ll skip the summary. But I couldn’t take my eyes off it. And no, it’s not because of Matthew McGorgeousCheekbones.

I saw it as a story of exploring dimensions we haven’t discovered yet, of using science alongside the intangible connections between people, the idea of our understanding of time and space being enhanced by our pull of love for other people. It was so close to themes that Madeleine L’Engle used in her Time Quintet, the books that starred in my childhood reading selections, that it felt like I was inside one of her books. How about the fact that the main story was about the love of a father for his daughter? Or that the daughter ended up being the one who held the solution?

I kind of don’t care that it doesn’t technically pass the Bechdel test. It’s a movie about time travel: people don’t actually talk directly to each other a lot.

So maybe I could ease up on my space scoffing. Maybe I could remember that I grew up loving books that were about science and scientists and time travel and tesseracts. YES TESSERACTS.

If I had been reading one of Ms. L’Engle’s books *while* Tim watched Interstellar, my world might just have folded in upon itself in a singularity. But what a blissful ending for me.