You develop an instant global consciousness, a people orientation, an intense dissatisfaction with the state of the world, and a compulsion to do something about it. From out there on the moon, international politics look so petty. You want to grab a politician by the scruff of the neck and drag him a quarter of a million miles out and say, ‘Look at that, you son of a bitch.
I was a naval officer and aviator. I tested airplanes and got selected to be an astronaut later on.
I never declared I wanted to be an astronaut, as I considered that was presumptuous.
