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Saturday 22 November 2008

Slow Life

Out of this world

They are such an excellent couple, a team: a binary system. Colin consumed by curiosity, curiosity linked to a V12 traction drive, ever practical in the face of the absolute, constantly seeking to put form on the indeterminate and kept in a stable orbit by Judith’s balancing, supportive, illuminating gravity.

Colin cut his teeth as a scientist analysing pieces of the moon brought back to Earth by the Apollo astronauts. I briefly owned a few crumbs of the moon from one of those missions. They were a gift from a friend with connections at NASA. They were magical things. I’d sit holding one when the moon was up and marvel at how someone had gone there and brought this thing back. They made brilliant wedding presents. Moon rocks are just the beginning, though. There’s a whole universe out there.

The first time I met Colin he was holding a meteorite. That was the first one I’d seen, a piece of Mars. Since then I’ve seen quite a few, including the most famous one of all, also from Mars, ALH84001, which is famous because it looks very much as if it contains bacteria, although it’s not been conclusively proved. Meteorites are endlessly fascinating. A lot of the ones I’ve seen fit snugly in the palm. There is something wonderful about being able to hold something comfortably that has been floating around in space for longer than the Earth has existed: a cold, bite-sized piece of elsewhere.

Life here probably started with a Martian meteorite. Mars used to have a substantial atmosphere. It has water, like Colin said, and it’s a bit further from the sun, so it would have cooled quicker than the Earth, allowing biology to start there before it would have done here. About 70 tons of Mars falls to Earth every year, material ejected from meteorite impacts there, and it wouldn’t have taken a miracle for bacteria in a meteorite from Mars to reach earth intact. It might be a meteorite that sees us all off, too. That’s what did it for the dinosaurs, by the looks of things.

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