 I think I have the coolest job in the military. I think I have the coolest job on the planet, quite honestly, or off the planet. I thought of being an astronaut kind of like being a professional football player. Like, little kids might dream of doing that, but come on, that's not really reality. And I put that in the same ballpark. I thought, that would be really awesome, but superheroes get to do that. And I'm not a superhero. When I was a lieutenant in the Army, my boss handed me the memorandum. This would have been in 1990 probably, that the Army was looking for people that had the following minimum qualifications to apply to the astronauts. That was the first time it occurred to me that that was like real people got to do that. I've had two tether failure. There are a variety of pathways to become an astronaut. We have many that have backgrounds in aviation as pilots, also as engineers, as scientists. And then medical doctors make up one of the professions that often become astronauts. But there are a variety of different professions you can have, and all of those are valid pathways to become an astronaut. You know, I look at my bio and one of the things that makes me proud is that I made my 10-year-old self proud. And so when I talk to young women and young men that have high career aspirations to do anything, professional sports, military, doctor, I mean, congressman, whatever they want to do, the big thing is to be true to yourself and to be passionate. And we tell the candidates that come and they want to be astronauts and they always ask us and they say, should I go to this university? Should I major in this or that? Should I get this job? And we say, you have to do what you're passionate about because otherwise you're never going to have enough energy to do all the hard work that it takes if you don't actually enjoy doing it. The nice thing about it is, in the process of trying to become an astronaut, you can pick up a lot of other skills. But don't make success or failure for your entire life be based on whether or not you become an astronaut. The path to that, though, if you have so many benefits that you're seeking more education, just working hard in a team, making sure that your teams are successful. It's not all about the individual, you being the best all the time. It's about you making sure all the other people around you are their best. My army career was better than I could have imagined it. There are so many opportunities out there and I looked for those challenges and I took them and the army never disappointed. And I was able to become an astronaut because I had those opportunities that the army presented. I had the skills that the army gave to me. And so whatever your dream is, whether that has anything to do with the space program at all, whatever it is, your goal is, the army can help you get there. But you know what's neat about being here is that you just step back and you get to do so many cool things and contribute to something that is so unifying. No matter where you go, people know astronauts and it's respectful and I think it's so unifying. And I think right now in our world, anything that can be such a unifying force, not only across our nation but across the globe, that is really vital right now. Mark Vandahy, Alexander Mazurkan and Joe Acaba lifting off and now on their way to the International Space Station. When I first looked out that window, what really struck me was how big the contrast was between the sunlit earth and the absolute blackness of space. It made the earth seem very isolated to me. That was the emotion I had but the grandeur of the earth was amazing. It's so important for the army to have astronauts because we have always been involved in exploration in the United States. In fact, the Corps of Engineers in the army helped explore the western United States and Lewis and Clark involved, their expeditions involved the army. So I think historically it makes sense and it's something we're just continuing. There's a long tradition of it.