A Boy and Dr. Neil deGrasse Tyson

We had been waiting for this night for the last two months.  The tickets had been bought thanks to a friend who wanted Anderson to get a chance to see one of the most influential minds on the planet.

Dr. Neil deGrasse Tyson was delivering his first lecture in the state of Maine on Wednesday night to a packed house at the Merrill Auditorium in Portland. The diversity in age of the ticketholders surprised me. I, personally, thought I was the only one bringing a child with me but there were at least twenty under the age of twelve sitting in the audience. One nine year old even succeeded in impressing Dr. Tyson by answering a question loudly proving himself smarter than some people twice his age.

Anderson has had a fascination with the universe since the age of five. Living in the country, the stars at night are big and bright in Maine and deep in the heart of a child. I can’t count the number of times we have rushed outside to see the International Space Station drift across the sky. Or the nights where he has pointed out a certain star and told me its name and how many light years away it is.

When I told him Dr. Tyson was coming to Maine he said “The man from the Big Bang Theory?” Yes, one in the same. “You mean the man that said Pluto’s not a real planet anymore?” Yes, that man. “Can we go?” He got pretty excited. I told him maybe. I had no idea that tickets to see a lecture were the same price as to see a concert.  By chance, a woman I know found out that he wanted to see him and handed me a check and said “Take him. It’s on me. Let that boy have his superhero.”

If that doesn’t restore your faith in humanity, I don’t know what will.

And so we went to see his superhero.

Dressed in jeans, buttoned-down shirt, sport coat and, coincidentally, no shoes he took the stage (even though the house lights weren’t working properly) to the thunderous applause of almost 1900 that were in attendance. You would have thought Paul Simon or Ed Sheeran had come out from behind the curtain.

Who was this man?

To Anderson, he’s the space guy. When I told him we had tickets, we decided to do a little research on him. We found out that he grew up in Bronx, NY, and wanted to become an astrophysicist at an early age. We read that he loved stars and space and discovering new things. His first experience was at the Hayden Planetarium at the American Museum of Natural History in New York and now he is the Director of it.

For two hours, we listened to him talk, joke and mesmerize us with passages from Carl Sagan. He taught us about where we came from, what we were related to, how very big the universe is and how very small we really are. Anderson would laugh and the adults near us, surprised to hear a young voice, turned to see who it was. They smiled when they saw him enjoying himself. I couple of the ushers were sitting behind us and one of them gave me a thumbs up. They loved hearing how happy he was.

Toward the very end there was time for questions and answers. We were in the balcony so there was no chance of us getting in line for that. We stayed and listened.

Then the most wonderful part of the entire experience happened.

While answering the nine year old’s question, he said (and I am paraphrasing because I can’t remember word for word) something like this:

“If you’re a parent or an adult who knows children, take them to see someone who knows something. Let them hear from a professional the knowledge and the excitement they have for the position they hold.”

That’s exactly what I was doing. If you could have seen Anderson’s face as he hung on every word Dr. Tyson was saying, then you’d know his words are true. I was so overwhelmed by hearing this and seeing his face, I started to tear up. I looked at him knowing I did the right thing by keeping him out late on a school night to hear man talk about space. But it was much more than that.

It was an experience together. It was a mother helping further her son’s dream of space and stars and developing what he wants to be when he grows up. Now, that dream may change (although I hope it doesn’t) and, if it does, then I will try to support him with that dream. I will do what Dr. Tyson says and take him to another professional that can put forth the knowledge and excitement about what they do to instill in him a thirst for that knowledge.

I put Anderson to bed and he thanked me for taking him. He said since it was getting darker earlier we could take the telescope out and check out the sky more often. It was something we could do together.

I don’t see his love for the universe ending anytime soon. That’s fine by me because I don’t see my love for him or his for me ending anytime soon either.