"Returning to Earth, that was the challenging part"
December 25, 2014 1:04 AM   Subscribe

 
Of all the K-razy Konspiracies regarding "We Never Went to the Moon", one of my favorites was "the astronauts who went to the moon did not come back with breathless descriptions or intense narratives of the experience of going". They would quote curt interviews from the astronauts as "proof" in their sea of "proof".

As the article makes clear, the type of personality willing to step forward and strap themselves in on top of a bomb and get blown off the planet towards a rotating rock are not the kind of people prone to gushing, introspective poetry. And in fact, it's the kind of personality that can crush you internally.

BUT THEN WHAT ABOUT THE LENSES etc
posted by jscott at 1:28 AM on December 25, 2014 [16 favorites]


Buzz is an interesting man and this is an interesting article about him--don't give up halfway down the first page like I almost did, annoyed with the writing style. It settles down.

I wonder if his father really thought about his son as the moon "runner-up", or if that's Buzz's assumption. He's been carrying that baggage, in any case, for as long as I've been alive.

He's the same age as my father...I have a tough time reconciling the two. Buzz is still alive. My father is...waiting. /derail
posted by maxwelton at 2:11 AM on December 25, 2014 [5 favorites]


Urban legend has it that NASA planned for Buzz to go first but then at some point decided it would be Neil Armstrong instead because Neil, a less excitable guy, would handle the fame better.

If Armstrong Was Interesting.
posted by Sauce Trough at 2:25 AM on December 25, 2014 [10 favorites]


"Holy crap, Buzz Aldrin, you went to the moon"

I can't help but feel this owes something to this.
posted by univac at 2:31 AM on December 25, 2014 [1 favorite]


World's coolest 85-year old? Dig that beard!
posted by fairmettle at 3:04 AM on December 25, 2014


Also, try not to call him "a coward, and a liar, and a thief." He doesn't like that.
posted by Tell Me No Lies at 3:26 AM on December 25, 2014 [23 favorites]


I could watch Buzz Aldrin punching Bart Sibrel in his stupid face all day long.
posted by Mr. Bad Example at 3:39 AM on December 25, 2014 [52 favorites]


That's one solid right for a man -- one immensely satisfying right for mankind.
posted by pracowity at 3:49 AM on December 25, 2014 [73 favorites]


He was awesome in 30 Rock, yelling at the moon with LIz.
posted by kinetic at 4:26 AM on December 25, 2014 [18 favorites]


Blew a chance to get a grip and grin with Armstrong, hope to get a chance to do that with Aldrin someday. Someday soon.
posted by mwhybark at 4:43 AM on December 25, 2014


"Second comes right after first!"
posted by The Card Cheat at 5:14 AM on December 25, 2014


I love that Buzz wasn't only some tough test pilot, he was also really smart. PhD from MIT smart. And he wore a Mickey Mouse watch in his official service photo. I love Buzz.
posted by leotrotsky at 5:24 AM on December 25, 2014 [13 favorites]


The idea that the only thing that's important is being the first guy out the door is very strange.
posted by thelonius at 5:25 AM on December 25, 2014 [21 favorites]


The idea that the only thing that's important is being the first guy out the door is very strange.

You wouldn't want lunar sloppy seconds, would you?

The whole plant-the-flag race to be first, whether to the moon or up mountains or the recent rash of invented firsts ("first person to jump off this cliff holding a dog and wearing yellow stripes") seems really silly to me, but it plays incredibly strongly with a certain version of masculine achievement and competition.

But that aside, the punch video is awesome. Good for him.
posted by Dip Flash at 5:34 AM on December 25, 2014 [1 favorite]


The funny thing is that, if Armstrong were to have gone second, I don't think it would have bothered him in the slightest.

That's probably why they picked him to go first.
posted by leotrotsky at 5:35 AM on December 25, 2014 [4 favorites]


The funny thing is that, if Armstrong were to have gone second, I don't think it would have bothered him in the slightest.

That's probably why they picked him to go first.


Or, per TFA:
A more likely explanation begins with the fact that Buzz was supposed to be the first man to walk on the moon. That's how they practiced it, because that's how NASA did things back then: The commander drove and the pilot did the space walk. Neil, the senior [officer], was the commander and so naturally he would stay in the driver's seat while Buzz, the pilot, opened the hatch and got out.

But there was a hitch in the plan. The hatch itself. It was in front of the astronauts, on the floor. It hinged inward, so you had to pull it open. The hinges were on Buzz's side, so it swung toward him, blocking him. Neil had the clear path out, not Buzz. And no, you couldn't trade positions; the lunar module was about the size of a pup tent and the walls were thin as Reynolds Wrap, so you had to be careful not to...lean on it. Once Neil was out, Buzz had to close the hatch, move over to Neil's side, and then reopen it to get out.
posted by Etrigan at 5:45 AM on December 25, 2014 [21 favorites]


The idea that the only thing that's important is being the first guy out the door is very strange.

Particularly since luck and timing from decisions made years earlier turned out to be pretty impactful. Hell, if things had gone a bit quicker with the Lunar Module design and testing, the first men on the Moon would have been Pete Conrad and Alan Bean.

Had Mike Collins not recovered from neck surgery, the First Men would have Neil and Fred Haise, while Buzz circled above.

Had Neil Armstrong not been such an easy going Commander, Aldrin would have never walked on the Moon, because lots of the other Commanders didn't like Buzz's habit of raising lots of questions and going off on tangents.

Had the crew of Gemini 9 not died in plane crash, which allowed Buzz to move from the backup to prime crew of Gemini 12, who knows if he would have even made it into Apollo.

There is something wonderful about reading an article on Christmas morning about that paints Aldrin as a doddering fool, living off past glories.

You know why nobody ever talks bad about Neil Armstrong or Mike Collins? 'Cause they rarely did or do interviews and moved on with their lives.

But there was a hitch in the plan. The hatch itself.

The hatch story if bullshit, a seemingly politically safe choice. Between the two of them, Neil had the most seniority and was the Commander of the ship and the Commander gets to be first off the ship if he so choses, period. Plus, he had less of an ego about it and was helluva speaker. The higher ups made the choice and the hatch thing was just convenient way of making it look like they weren't picking between the two.
posted by Brandon Blatcher at 5:49 AM on December 25, 2014 [9 favorites]


Between the two of them, Neil had the most seniority and was the Commander of the ship and the Commander gets to be first off the ship if he so choses, period.... The higher ups made the choice and the hatch thing was just convenient way of making it look like they weren't picking between the two.

If that first part is true, then why did the higher-ups have to make a choice and make it look like they weren't? Why didn't they just say, "Commander gets out first, because he's the commander"?

I don't disbelieve you, it just seems like an unnecessary extra layer of deceit if that's the case.
posted by Etrigan at 6:07 AM on December 25, 2014 [1 favorite]


Getting old's not for sissies. You wish he could be still, but that's not him. The right stuff.
posted by Trochanter at 6:17 AM on December 25, 2014 [2 favorites]


I believe it was because Buzz was pushing to be first, so they wanted a technical reason that made it look objectively non-partisian. Originally NASA hadn't given a whole lot of thought to who would be first, then the public interest swelled and they needed to figure stuff out

I did an essay on the subject of how Armstrong got to be first man on the Moon, called "Path to History," back in 2011, see page 24 of this old issue of MeFi Mag.
posted by Brandon Blatcher at 6:22 AM on December 25, 2014 [3 favorites]


Collins really comes off as being the most cheerful of the three, despite his underappreciated role. He's the Andy Summers of Apollo.
posted by RobotVoodooPower at 6:26 AM on December 25, 2014 [12 favorites]


Buzz Aldrin's dad sounds like a real asshole.
posted by Pope Guilty at 6:27 AM on December 25, 2014 [17 favorites]


Etrigan, also check out this linked article, which talks about some of behind the sciences "action" about who would be first to step on the Moon.

Collins really comes off as being the most cheerful of the three, despite his underappreciated role.

He really was, of that crew. He was the most comfortable in front of the cameras, and most relaxed. Later turned down the chance to walk on the Moon, because the rigorous training was disrupting his family. Helluva a guy
posted by Brandon Blatcher at 6:31 AM on December 25, 2014 [4 favorites]


People ask people to watch their scotch.
People send people up to the moon.
When they return, well there isn't much.
People be careful not to crest too soon.

-David Berman
posted by blue t-shirt at 7:24 AM on December 25, 2014 [5 favorites]


I always love how he handled Ali G.
posted by juiceCake at 7:34 AM on December 25, 2014 [4 favorites]


I'm a Neil Armstrong guy. My wife asked the other day, "Who's that face on your phone's homescreen and how come you never change it?" It's because Neil Armstrong is the awesome. I never met him, and that helps me hold him in the highest esteem.

People love Buzz. He's got a cool name. He does good things for space.

The astronaut I love a lot these days is Story Musgrave. He's just awesome too. Character through-and-through but I do not know a more can-do human being. (Check out his video here.) This past October, after spending a polite amount of time getting jocked by professional space geeks at a space science conference and then speaking, Story politely said good-night and excused himself explaining he had to leave to spend Halloween with his youngest child, his 10-year old daughter Story. This is a human being who has his priorities in order.

Speaking of priorities, for me it would have been great if at least one of the first three human beings to the moon would have been a woman. Dare to dream.

Buzz Aldrin wants more out of life. However, now is the time for another generation to take the lead. Yet he need not worry about second-place. Beil beat him to the moon, but Buzz beat Neil to our digitalized present. That is, Aldrin beat Neil to having an actual social media presence, and being digitalized makes being actually present forever a modern likelihood. There is so much Buzz source material now, he will be with us forever.

And if you're going to be remembered forever—second human on the moon!–being immortally, vitally depicted is certainly a worthy bonus.
posted by Mike Mongo at 7:52 AM on December 25, 2014 [2 favorites]


Oh my gosh, juicecake.

Buzz Aldrin to Ali G: "Things are funny-- comedic-- because they mix the real with the absurd."
posted by moonlight on vermont at 8:45 AM on December 25, 2014 [1 favorite]


Well worth the read, thanks.
posted by salvia at 8:46 AM on December 25, 2014


"It's something we did," he says. "Now we should do something else."

I love the moon and the moon guys and the reach exceeding the grasp and all that--even if there is some ugly misogyny in the fighter pilot culture that preceded it and a lot of burying the role of women in the early space program/computer sciences. It's majestic, the early space program, even if you look at it warts and all, instead of rosy-tinted history. It's incredible that we did it at all.

Yet it feels as though we're not trying anymore. Not just space, but social change and humanity in general. It seems at some point in recent memory, we got overwhelmed or came up with empty pockets or just stopped being able to get out of the holes we dug with our failures and gave up. We're leaving all the important changes in the provenace of the dabblers or the very rich hobbyists and giving no support to the people who just want to work in the daily world of something greater than ourselves.
posted by crush-onastick at 8:50 AM on December 25, 2014 [10 favorites]


Also wtf, Buzz's grandfather and mother both committed suicide "right before we went to the moon" and people are being snide about him having a mental breakdown/handling things less awesomely than Neil did once he'd completed the mission and come back to Earth?
posted by moonlight on vermont at 8:52 AM on December 25, 2014 [21 favorites]


Buzz Aldrin's dad sounds like a real asshole.

Until quite recently, dads were made to feel like they weren't doing their job if they weren't being an asshole.
posted by bonobothegreat at 8:55 AM on December 25, 2014 [15 favorites]


Great article. I think both Neil and Buzz are great examples of what we can achieve through determination and sheer bloody mindedness. There's no need to worry about who is first.
posted by arcticseal at 9:06 AM on December 25, 2014 [3 favorites]


Son of Moon.
posted by pracowity at 9:16 AM on December 25, 2014 [1 favorite]


I love that Buzz wasn't only some tough test pilot, he was also really smart. PhD from MIT smart.

Buzz, in fact, was not a test pilot. He was selected in Astronaut Group 3, which was the first group that didn't require test pilot experience. He was a combat pilot, 60+ missions in F-86s with two confirmed kills, and commanded an F-100 squadron as well. He had a very successful USAF career that almost certainly would have result in him reaching general rank if he hasn't joined NASA.

He was a hell of a pilot, but he was not a test pilot. Neil Armstrong was, indeed, he stood out because he was the first astronaut selectee that wasn't a currently serving military officer. Buzz was expected to serve in the USAF as a career officer, having graduated from West Point, Armstrong was called up and left the Navy after his term expired as a decorated naval aviator, spent 8 years in the reserve, went to college, graduated, and then became a civilian test pilot. His first application to (then) NACA so impressed them that even thought they didn't have any slots, they called around and found him a job, when a slot opened up, they called him back to Edwards AFB.

They came from very different worlds and were very different people, and their reactions to becoming two of the most famous people in the world were very different. One thing that they did have in common is that they both were crushed by the idea that they had become too valuable to fly in space again. Neil's response was to become More Neil, More Academic Test Pilot. Buzz's response was first crushing despair, then to become More Buzz, more the Hotshot Test Pilot.
posted by eriko at 9:39 AM on December 25, 2014 [8 favorites]


Of all the K-razy Konspiracies regarding "We Never Went to the Moon", one of my favorites was "the astronauts who went to the moon did not come back

I've heard of this conspiracy. Apparently NASA's last communication with the actual astronauts who landed on the Moon was a dejected "I don't want to live on that planet anymore" followed by some sort of weird transcendent humming sound and then complete radio silence. The lunar module never ascended (some would say it vanished in a bright flash of light) and Collins returned to Earth alone to be hastily united with the "backup" crew that assumed the identities of Aldrin and Armstrong.
posted by RonButNotStupid at 10:01 AM on December 25, 2014 [3 favorites]


Flow. NASA was an organization seemingly in a state of flow, with everyone within it in their own states of flow. Amazing things can happen when you're in that state. Flow is the limerance of getting things done.

I like that Buzz seems like a very human person, filled to the brim with doubts and stubbornness and other flaws in addition to his many accomplishments. It doesn't sound like someone you necessarily want to work for or have to endure involuntarily, but it helps (me, anyway) to understand that amazingly accomplished people are both gods and men.
posted by maxwelton at 10:38 AM on December 25, 2014 [2 favorites]


Until quite recently, dads were made to feel like they weren't doing their job if they weren't being an asshole.

Astute observation, though I'm tempted to say the pendulum's swung too far the other way at present.
posted by fairmettle at 11:00 AM on December 25, 2014 [2 favorites]


maxwelton: Flow. NASA was an organization seemingly in a state of flow, with everyone within it in their own states of flow.

To get to that point, though, NASA suffered through some decidedly not-flowy times. Now that it's been done, we forget how much of a badass you had to be to strap yourself to the top of five million pounds of explosives when only a few years before, this had happened a whole bunch of times.
posted by clawsoon at 11:33 AM on December 25, 2014 [2 favorites]


It's been 20+ years since I read it, but I recall Michael Collins' book Carrying the Fire as being pretty great.
posted by chimpsonfilm at 11:56 AM on December 25, 2014 [1 favorite]


It's a modest home with a sprawling view of West L.A. and leather couches and dark walls tidily decorated with Buzz memorabilia. Fox News stays on the big screen.
Disappointing.
posted by Flunkie at 12:54 PM on December 25, 2014 [5 favorites]


I'm guessing they psychiatrically evaluate the astronauts pretty thoroughly these days and if you have even a tinge of philosophy, mysticism or woo, no moon for you!

This is why I never want to go to space. I'm pretty sure my mind would collapse from trying to make meaning from the meaningless. The enormity and the powerlessness of it all.
posted by St. Peepsburg at 3:03 PM on December 25, 2014 [1 favorite]


The first curse is to lose your children in old age. The second curse is to lose your spouse in middle age. The third curse is to achieve your life's dream in youth.

I have an odd line of work and sometimes when people at parties ask me 'How could I get into that?' I say, 'well, have you had anything really horrible happen to you?'

One of my clients has written a book about her Horrible Thing and before we met for the first time she said over the phone 'Just don't look at me with sad eyes. I hate that.
I'm trying to eat dinner with someone and I can tell when they're thinking about the book.'

It's hard when people have a relationship with you that you're not a part of.
posted by bq at 3:18 PM on December 25, 2014 [17 favorites]


The enormity and the powerlessness of it all.

What sacked Buzz was not the enormity of the Universe, but the banality of the world he returned to. He was still trying to do new and interesting things but all anyone wanted to talk about was Moon Moon Moon.
posted by localroger at 3:33 PM on December 25, 2014 [5 favorites]


It's been 20+ years since I read it, but I recall Michael Collins' book Carrying the Fire as being pretty great.

It is and highly recommended as a story of a very human man being an astronaut in the Gemini and Apollo program.
posted by Brandon Blatcher at 3:40 PM on December 25, 2014 [3 favorites]


I was a NASA brat in the 70s and as I recall (I was very young so you can take this with a grain of salt) while of course there was friction at times, the astronauts were all thought to be heroes. So there had to be some fair way to hand out the cool assignments. Deke Slayton was in charge of picking and I think we can take him at his word that he did the fair thing. He simply used seniority and luck that it was the Apollo 11 crew that got to be the first to land. Slayton thought all of the people working on the project were deserving, so seniority would be the fairest way to decide.

Personally I wish it had been Alan Bean, because he was the guy that would take me around to see the cool stuff when I went with dad to work.
posted by wobumingbai at 10:35 PM on December 25, 2014 [12 favorites]


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