Only the Astronauts by Ceridwen Dovey

Author:Ceridwen Dovey [Dovey, Ceridwen]
Language: eng
Format: epub
ISBN: 9781760145170
Publisher: Penguin Random House Australia

Moonpeaks

The mountains and valleys on the Moon are not made by plate tectonics, they just trace the edges of plains or craters. Millions and millions of years can pass, and perhaps only an inch will be eroded from the rim of a crater. Sometimes new impact craters are made, but otherwise the landscape endures.

The Moon might be alive and active beneath its crust. We can take guesses, but nobody knows. They did not teach me that in astronaut training.

The peak of Malapert Massif can almost always be seen from Earth because it’s in near-constant sunlight.

Mons Huygens is the tallest mountain on the Moon.

The siren call to conquer mountains wherever they are is why this sculpture lies in this very place, within the Apennine mountain chain. Each Apollo mission had to be braver than the last, had to travel further, climb higher.

As the first, it had been decided Buzz and I would play it safe, landing in the Sea of Tranquility because it was low and flat. But the astronauts who came later went to the Apollonius highlands and tried to climb the flank of a crater, giving up before they could reach the rim.

And then they came here, to this mountain range, and drove the buggy as fast as they could. Even then, they struggled to make it very far up the steep slopes.

Those who first looked at the Moon through a telescope and saw mountains were punished for it. The heavenly bodies in Earth’s sky were not meant to be craggy and lumpy and uneven but perfect spheres, as god intended. The Moon was meant to be a smooth mirror of glass or water, reflecting Earth back at itself. The terminator, the line marking the difference between day and night on the Moon, was meant to be rigidly straight, not wonky and curved as the sunlight stumbled across these mountains and valleys.

Moon mountains exist on a much smaller scale than on Earth. Mount Pico and Mount Piton, within the Sea of Showers, are tiny compared to their namesakes on Earth. It was the creator of the plaster models of the Moon’s surface who thought that, through his telescope, they resembled the volcanic mountains of Tenerife. We cannot see the Moon except through the gauze and gaze of Earth.

If you are unsure how you feel about a Moon mountain, bend over and look at it upside down. Shake off your gaze, see it stretching out – the regolith lit silver by the Sun – into the blackness of the sky. It no longer exists in reference to you. This will give you an inkling of how the Moon must see itself.

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