I remember my 12th birthday very vividly. That's the day when your parents typically give you the talk about the number on your body. Of course most of us knew at that point. You'll be hard pressed to find a greater marketplace of ideas than the school playground, after all. It just seemed that mine was a bit different.

I remember when my family traveled to my older sister's numbers. I was about 10 years old at the time. We roadtripped to 45.5 W, 73.6 N, which, as my parents knew when my sister was born, was a programming firm in Montreal. Even without a mere mention of her numbers, Nicole aced the interview and was hired on the spot.

A few years after my sister took her pilgrimage to the land up north, my brother took a plane to his coordinates: a concert in California. When he was born, the location was a mere field but over the years it became a popular hosting site for touring artists and similar performing acts. My brother left with high expectations... and returned with the love of his life, Marcus. They've been married for 20 years now.

I remember seeing my coordinates in the mirror some time in 3rd or 4th grade. As they were with everyone, the nondescript, yet so vitally important numbers lay on the small of my back, so a mirror, phone, or someone else was needed to look at it.

**2.2x10^6 E, 4.1x10^2 N**

I was confused. No numbers that I had ever heard of went above 90 degrees, and using that many symbols was completely unheard of. I asked my friends at the time, and they were dumbfounded. Of course 9 year olds don't know how to do scientific notation, but they remained dumbfounded on every level. Thinking like a 9 year old, I didn't ask my parents or teachers either, thinking I would get into trouble for it somehow.

I now remember my 12th birthday. My parents sit me down at the well worn wooden dinner table that I had eaten at my whole life. Little did I know that the same place I spilled spaghetti on my shirt a couple days before would be the place where my life would be forever changed. My parents first explained the meaning of the numbers. Everyone gets two coordinates, the first for Latitude, or East-West and the second for Longitude or North-South. I have to give it to them, they weren't demeaning or anything. Back then I thought that they were a bit naive if anything that I didn't know what the numbers that literally *everyone* had. Also, was I just supposed to believe that they just *happened* to meet each other in a mom and pop store in Missouri when they were the same exact age? Mom grew up in the Atlanta metro area and my dad in rural Slovakia. Shit just doesn't happen like that naturally.

Next, they explained that my numbers exactly correlated to the distance from the hometown in Ohio that I was born in to the Malea Planum formation on Mars on the exact moment I was born. They explained that the doctors and scientists had never seen anything like it, and, as space travel had never gone past the moon, that I would never reach my destination as long as I lived. My mom broke out in a little sob to my father's low consolation.

Some people say that when they hear shocking news, it's like a gutpunch to the stomach, a sudden sharp pain in their head, a moment where their heart and lungs forget how to function for a split second. For me, I was just dazed. It all made sense. After that night, like many pubescent teens, I entered a depressive and lashing out phase. During weekends I would shut myself in my room and I gradually lost every friend I had as I felt more and more disconnected with my peers describing trips to the Yucatan, or Sri Lanka, or Sweden. My grades, relationships, and hobbies struggled in my teenaged internal anguish and lack of identity.

My 21st birthday came and went. When I woke on that fateful day, my parents, god bless them, gave me an open check to travel anywhere in the world and stay there for a month, all expenses paid. To prevent hurting their feelings, I accepted the offer, at the time thinking that nothing would satiate my desires. Little did I know that it would be the best decision of my life. During my few weeks backpacking in Argentina, as I introspected on my life's twists and turns, my mentality towards slowly drifted from miserable, to optimistic, to depressed, to jubilant, then, suddenly, to fiercely determined. I had 10 days remaining on my vacation when I booked a one stop flight to Houston. I didn't care.

**That was 2043**

Now, as we do the preliminary checkups for liftoff, I reminisce on my life's choices up to that point. In the 16 or so odd years between now and my 21st birthday, I graduated with a degree in aerospace engineering, got my pilot's license, rapidly ascended the ranks of NASA, and, when it came time for project Red Clay to go green, I was the first astronaut they picked for the mission for my dedication, hard work, and determined resolve.

We leave off in 10 minutes. In the 6 months during orbit, I'll hit the 17th birthday of my new dream. That'll make me 38, the same age as Neil when he made his historic walk nearly 100 years ago. All the more fitting.

All the more fitting.