when I was a child, i used to press my eyes really hard. until little purple galaxies exploded in my irises and i saw constellations and heavenly bodies i never dreamt would have existed. i did it until it hurt, and i removed my hands from my eyes, but everywhere i looked for the next 10 minutes would still have pulsing clusters and miniature stars and i was in awe of it, and afraid at the same time.
when I was a child, I was in awe of space. my uncle was an amateur astronomist, and when i was little, i would sneak into his room and look at all his planet posters. he had tons of them, in scrolls, everywhere. my favourite was one of the solar system, of which he subsequently framed and hung up, so i wouldn't damage it, rolling and unrolling it all the time. i could name all the planets (including pluto who could leave our little dwarf out) by the age of 6, and point out to you where the north star was in the sky at night, as well as the common constellations.
when I was a child, during more peaceful times, my brother got curious device, in which you poked holes with a needle onto a piece of paper which folded cleverly into a dome, and fitted over a light, turning little pinpricks of light into a ceiling of constellations. in the dark, i would teach my brother which stars were which, and pointed out every constellation i knew. we would plan rocket trips to sirius, or alpha centauri, and live there without any adults, until our giggling got my parents to come into the room and confiscate the light.
as i grew up, my brother discovered dinosaurs, and i discovered aliens. space started to become less comforting, and i grew to be afraid of it. sometimes in the shower, i would think of myself, in the little cubicle, being a little girl, in little Singapore, in little Asia, in little Earth, in our little solar system, in the little Milky Way, in the huge, never ending Universe. i felt very small and alone. i was very small. after all, i was nine. i never told anyone about this though. i knew my mom would send me to bed with my milo/milk and tell me "don't think so much la" and shrug it off.
turning eleven, I discovered A Wrinkle In Time. That book scared me more than i ever thought it would. because once again, it showed me how small i was in the great universe of ours. i remember the part where Meg travelled into a two dimensional world and couldn't breathe, and i held my own breath until i turned blue and started choking (I was that into the story). I was fascinated by tesseracts, but my eleven year old mind couldn't figure it out. setting it aside as a curiosity, i soon moved on to other, more normal things like clothes and boys and school.
now, i'm seventeen. and i have watched the most brilliant film ever. christopher nolan is a fucking genius. everyone raved about interstellar, and once i found out it was about space, i knew i had to watch it. INTERSTELLAR WAS SIMPLY... EXQUISITE. intricate, elaborate, beautifully pieced together with meticulous effort into every frame. I was simply blown away. I have legit never cried so many times in a movie I was so bloody into it my eyeliner was running down my face at the end. The establishing shots were wondrous to behold. The scoring was perfect. I don't think i can sleep tonight, i'm still shell shocked at the beauty of this film. during that 2 and a half hours, my awe and wonder and fear of the universe came rushing back at once after lying dormant for the better part of a decade.
there is so much out there that we don't know about. and i am afraid. but i am also eager to know more. every time an establishing shot appeared during the film, i felt the familiar rush of awe and fear that i experienced when i was nine, alone in the universe, and i shivered. i am afraid of what's out there. i'm not quite sure what i really meant to say in this post, it's just that the movie triggered so many memories that i had forgotten till now, that i had to document it somehow. i wish singapore didn't have so much light pollution, i want to lie down and see the stars and pretend i'm seven again, and point out where exactly Pollux is in Gemini. (i still can by the way, but the skies are never dark enough to see any stars, let alone constellations)
