I tell her I feel fine. If I were on the first crew to reach the surface of Mars, just now touching down on the red planet after a yearlong journey and a wild-hot descent through its atmosphere, I feel like I would be able to do what needed to be done. One of the most important questions of my mission has been a simple yes or no: could you get to work on Mars? I wouldn’t want to have to build a habitat or hike ten miles, but I know I could take care of myself and others in an emergency, and that feels like a triumph.
I tell Amiko I’ll see her soon, and for the first time in a year that’s true.
Epilogue: Life on Earth
I’VE BEEN ASKED often what we learned from my year in space. I think sometimes people want to hear about one profound scientific discovery or insight, something that struck me (or the scientists on the ground) like a cosmic ray through my brain at some climactic moment during my mission. I don’t have anything like that to offer. The mission that I prepared for was, for the most part, the mission I flew. The data is still being analyzed as I write this, and the scientists are excited about what they are seeing so far. The genetic differences between my brother and me from this year could unlock new knowledge, not only about what spaceflight does to our bodies but also about how we age here on Earth. The Fluid Shifts study Misha and I did is promising in terms of improving astronauts’ health on long missions. The studies I did on my eyes—which don’t seem to have degraded further during this mission—could help solve the mystery of what causes damage to astronauts’ vision, as well as helping us to understand more about the anatomy and disease processes of the eye in general.
Results and scientific papers will continue to emerge over years and decades based on the four hundred experiments we conducted over the year. Misha and I were a sample size of only two—we need to see many more astronauts stay in space for longer periods of time before we can draw conclusions about what we experienced. I do feel as though I’ve made discoveries—it’s just that those discoveries can’t entirely be separated from what I’ve learned from my other missions in space, other periods of my life, other challenges, other lessons.
As much as I worked on scientific experiments, I think I learned at least as much about practical issues of how to conduct a long-range exploration mission. This is what crew members on ISS are always doing—we are not just solving problems and trying to make things better for our own spaceflights, but also studying how to make things better for the future. So even the smallest decisions I made or negotiations I undertook with the ground were directed toward larger questions of resource management. And the larger struggles of my mission—most notably, CO2 management and upkeep of the Seedra—will have a larger impact on future missions on the space station and future space vehicles. NASA has agreed to manage CO2 at a much lower target level, and better versions of carbon dioxide scrubbers are being developed that will one day replace the Seedra and make life better for future space travelers, and I’m thankful for that.
Personally, I’ve learned that nothing feels as amazing as water. The night my plane landed in Houston and I finally got to go home, I did exactly what I’d been saying all along I would do: I walked in the front door, walked out the back door, and jumped into my swimming pool, still in my flight suit. The sensation of being immersed in water for the first time in a year is impossible to describe. I’ll never take water for granted again. Misha says he feels the same way.
I’ve been assigned to a spaceflight or in training for one practically nonstop since 1999. It will be an adjustment to no longer be planning my life this way. I have a chance to reflect on what I’ve learned.
I’ve learned that I can be really calm in bad situations. I’ve known this about myself since I was a kid, but it has definitely been reinforced.
I’ve learned to better compartmentalize, which doesn’t mean forgetting about feelings but instead means focusing on the things I can control and ignoring what I can’t.
I’ve learned from watching my mother train to become a police officer that small steps add up to giant leaps.
I’ve learned how important it is to sit and eat with other people. While I was in space, I saw on TV one day a scene of people sitting down to eat a meal together. The sight moved me with an unexpected yearning. I suddenly longed to sit at a table with my family, just like the people on the screen, gravity holding a freshly cooked meal on the table’s surface so we could enjoy it, gravity holding us in our seats so we could rest. I had asked Amiko to buy a dining room table; she did, and sent me a picture of it. Two days after landing, I was sitting at the head of the new table, a beautiful meal my friend Tilman had sent over spread out on it, my family gathered around me. Amiko, Samantha, Charlotte, Mark, Gabby, Corbin, my father. I could see them all without moving my head. It was just how I’d pictured it. At one point in the after-dinner conversation, Gabby pointed urgently at Mark, then me, back and forth, back and forth. She was pointing out that Mark and I were both making exactly the same gesture, our hands folded on top of our heads. I’ve learned what it means to be together with family again.
I’ve learned that most problems aren’t rocket science, but when they are rocket science, you should ask a rocket scientist. In other words, I don’t know everything, so I’ve learned to seek advice and counsel and to listen to experts. I’ve learned that an achievement that seems to have been accomplished by one person probably has hundreds, maybe even thousands, of people’s minds and work behind it, and I’ve learned that it’s a privilege to be the embodiment of that work.
I’ve learned that Russian has a more complex vocabulary for cursing than English does, and also a more complex vocabulary for friendship.
I’ve learned that a year in space contains a lot of contradictions. A year away from someone you love both strains the relationship and strengthens it in new ways. I’ve learned that climbing into a rocket that may kill me is both a confrontation of mortality and an adventure that makes me feel more alive than anything else I’ve ever experienced. I’ve learned that this moment in American spaceflight is a crossroads where we can either renew our commitment to push farther out, to build on our successes, to keep doing harder and harder things—or else lower our sights and compromise our goals.
I’ve learned that grass smells great and wind feels amazing and rain is a miracle. I will try to remember how magical these things are for the rest of my life.
I’ve learned that my daughters are remarkable and incredibly resilient people, and that I have missed a piece of each of their lives that I can never get back.
I’ve learned that following the news from space can make Earth seem like a swirl of chaos and conflict, and that seeing the environmental degradation caused by humans is heartbreaking. I’ve also learned that our planet is the most beautiful thing I’ve ever seen and that we’re lucky to have it.