The title is “A Great Friday Post”, because that is what WeeWeed called it when I shared it with her last night.  She thinks (me too) that you will enjoy this story.  It was written by the author of “Rocket Boys”, Homer Hickam.  You may remember the movie, “October Sky”, which was based on his book (The name of the movie is an anagram of the name of the book).
I love everything that Homer writes, and  he is an amazing story in and of himself.  He grew up in the fifties and sixties in a West Virginia mining town; his dad was the Superintendent of the mine in Coalwood.  Homer was inspired by the space race, the launch of Sputnik, and his idol, Wernher von Braun.
The “Great Friday Post” is a story written by Homer a few years ago for Air & Space Magazine; I became acquainted with it yesterday, when Homer posted a link to it on his Facebook page, https://www.facebook.com/HomerHickam.

Flights & Fancy: You Go, Girl!

IN 1995, HAVING WORKED FOR over a year at the Marshall Space Flight Center in Huntsville, Alabama, designing the payload training curriculum for the International Space Station, I was ready for a vacation. My wife Linda and I decided to visit our friends Frank and Naomi Stewart and Naomi’s daughter, Rachel, in Bozeman, Montana, a grand place to relax. For the first three days, we spent every waking hour on the slopes. On the fourth day, a spring blizzard struck. Frank and I felt we’d best prepare for the storm, which we did mainly by opening the occasional bottle of wine. Frank, also an engineer, perused an article I had written for Air & Space that became the book Rocket Boys and then the film October Sky. He lifted a critical eye. “Can you still build a rocket, Homer?”
“Why, it’s like swimming,” I said. “Once you build a rocket, you never forget. Building a rocket is about as simple a thing as there is.”
The truth was, I hadn’t built a rocket for 35 years. But I wasn’t going to let that stop me. At that moment I spied a Barbie doll belonging to Rachel. “Frank, old boy,” I said, “I can not only still build a rocket. I can make anything into a rocket, including that doll.”
“Well, put your money where your mouth is, NASA boy!” Frank roared, slapping down a whole dollar bill.
The next day we slipped and slid to a department store, where I expected to find your standard Barbie. Instead, I was astonished to discover a Skating Star Barbie, Shopping Spree Barbie, Valentine Barbie, Teacher Barbie, Biker Barbie, and Picnic Barbie. After watching Frank and me furtively casing the doll section, a clerk advised us that these were just a few of hundreds of choices. “Is there a Rocket Barbie?” I asked.
The clerk thought for a moment, then said, “Why, dear, I don’t believe there is.”
“Well, there is now,” I told her, and chose the ponytailed Picnic Barbie, mainly because she was the cheapest.
“She has accessories,” the clerk said.
“Oh, she won’t need any accessories where she’s going,” I replied.
She gave me a suspicious look. “And where is that?”
I glanced at the ceiling. “Far, far away.”
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