A Song for the Stars

It's hard to pinpoint that exact moment in time when you realized you love something you keep on loving forever. I can't remember the day I first sat down and wrote a story. I can't remember the first time I sang. But there's one first that leads to another - a first that offers an idea of the age I was when I grew to adore the stars.

The day I wrote my first song.

Okay, so it's not really a song. It doesn't have a chorus or a bridge or any guitar chords to go along with it. But when I was age four, I wrote two lines in my journal and whipped up a tune for them. This was my first song:




Stephanie goes to outer space
and all the wayy
Stephanie goes to outer space
at dinner time

You are probably in awe right now. That right there is a work of genius.

I remember singing that song, quite proudly, at the dinner table. (That same day I may or may not have also penned a song about french fries and how much I liked them.) It's a silly memory nowadays, but it speaks to me because of the subject matter. When I was that age, I dreamed of growing up to be an astronaut. A wish coveted by many children, but I was gonna go to space for real. At a slightly older age, I tried to build an actual space ship out of cardboard. I was gonna traverse among the stars and planets, then keep on flying farther and farther, 'cause nothing would ever stop me up there. I would be free, floating through beauty.

The funny thing is that that's still my dream. I still get out of my car to walk into my house at night and pause for a moment to stare at the sky, at the moon and the sparkling lights. When I was on a roller coaster at Magic Mountain, we were going straight up toward the moon, and I imagined we'd just keep going until we got there.

Unfortunately, I'm stuck on earth at the moment. Until that day when space travel becomes available to the public and I miraculously have enough money to book a flight to the stars, I find an escape in stories, whether they're mine or written by others. Books are way too awesome. So are the stars.

by Philipp Salzgeber