When I was, a young girl, my.. wait.. That meme is getting really old. Did I just date myself? I hope not. Today, I am taking part in something very exciting. Scott’s Space is the Place Blog tour. Hopefully, you’ve seen it around because it’s a fun project with some very talented bloggers.
When I was a kid, I wanted to be an astronaut. To me, they were hero-magician wonderpeople and being one makes you “special”. I’m still a space and astronaut fangirl. There are some things you never grow out of. But I no longer want to be an astronaut myself.
Space is exciting and full of possibilities but with time, I also started to see it as lonely. It’s far and dark and that’s not where all my stuff is. Why would you want to leave everything you’ve ever known, would that be sad. Even if things aren’t great, they’re familiar. It’s where you belong, after all. And then, Gurren Lagann reminded me that home isn’t a place and it only exists if you fight for it, if you make it your own and if you see what else is out there.
Have I bored you guys by talking about Gurren Lagann yet? The series made a pretty big impact on me and the more time passes, the greater its influence seems to grow on me. Those final scenes showing our silhouetted heroes grown old and passing the torch to a new generation just flashed in my head and my heart did that funny squeezy thing it does when I have a crush. There is so much subtext and symbolism in that series. I could probably use it as a basis to discuss just about anything.
Today, however, I’m not going to dive into all those ethical quandaries and beautiful philosophical thesis, I’m just going to stick with the actual text. Gurren Lagann is a show about spaceships and aliens. And it reminded me, that home isn’t a place.
Looking to the stars and to outer space has always been a shared dream of humanity. Gurren Lagann shows us that humanity at its worst and humblest. Driven underground and forced to fight for the barest resources, this is a humanity that has been forcibly stripped of its pride an vigour. But even as despair sinks in, they still look to the stars. This drive to capture the mysteries of the universe is one of the most basic shared dreams of humanity. It’s part of who we are. It’s also part of why these people are so recognizable. It’s what spoke to the little kid in me that wanted to travel the milky way.
But as I grew up, I grew timid and cautious. Having nothing is a great freedom. As soon as you start to wrack up relationships and riches, they tie you down. Suddenly there are things you can’t leave behind. Suddenly you have a home.
Kamina and Simon started out with nothing. It was easy for them to strike out into the great unknown of the surface, what did they have to lose? But soon enough they started to make friends, rivals, to fall in love. They build a beautiful home for themselves. Comfortable and warm. Of course, they would take to space to defend it. But it’s from space that you can truly see how beautiful earth is.
It’s by having the courage to leave that you remember all the reasons to stay. What’s more, a home isn’t a place. Yoko was just as home teaching children on her little island as she was fighting among the stars. Simon would have would have followed Nia to another dimension and been comfortable. Part of Rossiu will always live in his underground village.
Space is indeed the place. A place of dreams and ambitions. A place where possibilities are endless. But it’s just too big to be home. A person can’t belong everywhere at once. Space is a place to remind us how nice it is to have somewhere to go back to. That’s a lesson that should never be forgotten.
I hope you enjoyed my attempt at this theme. I adored this series so much that I find it difficult to write about. My little heart just gets a jumbled up. But I love any excuse to talk about it so I’m so happy that Scott came up with this great idea!
If you missed it, yesterday Aria gave us a view of space in Yakusoku no Nanayamatsuri/Starlight Promises which you should definitely go read over HERE. And the fun is far from over, AJ from the Anointed Geek will probably go back to the rich Gurren Lagann well for tomorrow’s post on Studio Trigger in Space!
