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Dear John:
Things are just rotten up here.
Looking out the window is boring. The same oceans and continents, day after day. As for stars, there are just too many of them. Who can keep track? And besides, that comet is putting out so much light that it makes it difficult to see Cassiopeia.
Yesterday, they decided that three months is enough time to be in space, and that I will be coming home in the Soyuz capsule next weekend. We'll just leave the space station empty until the Shuttle crew arrives. Then, the whole Shuttle crew will stay aboard for six months, each of them working day and night, non-stop, in order to try to get all the experiments done that they had planned for me to do over the next two months.
When I arrive on Earth, NASA plans to send me to a Caribbean island for a year or two just to relax.
John. Mom may try to fool you by saying things like "you don't have to take a nap today", or "I'm sending you to Siberia"; don't fall for it. Beware!
Goodnight. I don't miss you at all.
Dad.
Back to Linenger's Letters to his Son
Curator:
Kim Dismukes
Responsible NASA Official: John Ira Petty