This post is contributed by Barnaby Porter. Read the previous post here.

Been there a mighty long time, that old moon of ours. Four and a half billion years just keeping planet Earth company, floating up there in heaven against the endless blackness of space and all that there is.

The span of time has not actually been forever, with no beginning or end, but it might as well have been for all we knew. And we didn’t know much; never did until just a few hundred thousand years ago, maybe a million, as our sentient species evolved with larger brains developing a steadily increasing awareness of and curiosity about the world around them. Planet Earth had become a life-friendly place by that time with a survivable climate and all the necessaries for food and shelter. And, with an endless availability of all manner of natural materials to do with and make things, our kin and ancestral hominids, we people, were fully occupied in the business of staying alive and perpetuating ourselves. Key to all that, and critical in all thinkers, was their keen power of observation and the ability to evaluate the usefulness of whatever resources were at hand. And, if they were of the clever sort, to be able to recognize opportunity wherever it cropped up, whether it was in the qualities of sticks and stones and bones that lent themselves to making tools and weapons; or whether they could be fashioned into animal traps or fishing weirs or boats; or perhaps it was in learning the value and uses of fire, or dogs or beasts of burden.

Our ancient ancestors leading up to now became very familiar with their worldly surroundings, their environmental niches, as did all adaptive animals and plants and lower organisms. Those that harbored thoughts must surely have felt degrees of relative safety (call their niches “comfort zones”) even if they were migrating herds or wandering nomads. Pole to pole, continent to continent, planet Earth was/is geographically and magnificently varied and dazzling with its abundance of life.

Along the way, substantial evidence accumulated among the brainier more developed beings who possessed very useful opposable thumbs. They evolved to have a heightened sense of appreciation for their world, demonstrated by many cave and wall paintings and carvings found around the globe, along with adaptive clothing, costumes, jewelry, musical instruments and elaborate ceremonies accompanied by dance. Such sensitively composed and detailed expressions of thinking minds were unquestionably the work of true artistic impulse and creativity, which runs the full gamut of intelligent thought, feelings and emotion. They obviously had had some time to ponder their beautiful world. What could it be all about?

It would be a very long time before those hominids could possibly envision the whole Earth for what it was – a huge, rocky planetary sphere of mountains, plains and bounding seas, hurtling through space at over a million mph. Wherever “home” was, it was the limit of what one could see of the planet from that one place. Nevertheless, rhythmical patterns of seasons and climate fluctuations must have become apparent. Most likely, early hominids came to depend upon them as regulators of life even fraught as they were with lots of surprises. This then might have been the first inkling in early minds of things working in alliance with outside, unseen forces – a planetary system.

There is one element in Earth’s planetary system that can be seen by every pair of eyes on the Earth. No matter where on the globe one stands, it is always there, overhead, every night and day, to be seen and to be wondered at: our lone, orbiting, beautiful, silvery, silent Moon.

Inherent in the words “planetary system” is the deep relationship between our Earth and the Moon, driven mainly by their respective gravities and to a lesser degree the light being reflected between the Sun, Earth and Moon. The Moon has a profound influence on Earth’s ocean currents and twice-daily tides. On its axial tilt and speed of rotation and its climate and seasons. Even the bio-rhythms of many living things on the planet are reflections of this planetary system relationship. To a degree, even to a marked degree, the early hominids and now modern-day humans were/are not exempted from this lunar influence. And here and now is where and when the history of Earth and the Moon are entering a new era, brought on by the workings and imaginations of the human mind.

For more or less ever, we and our hominid ancestors stared at and wondered endlessly about the Moon. What was it? Why was it there? What was it made of? Was it somehow related to spiritual forces? Why does it have different phases? Why do wolves howl at it?

The Moon seemed connected to daily life and the passage of time. How and why? It was always up there, a fixture in every person’s small private world. They could always be alone with it, to daydream, to admire the moonlit cast in the night forest and to share privately with a lover, even from a great distance.

The Moon was alone and private and unviolated, with all of its mystery, all through history, hundreds of thousands of years, that is how it was.

Then in the years 1967-1972 something called the Apollo space missions took place. Six spacecraft landed twelve men on the Moon. They put up the American flag, walked around, took thousands of photographs, gathered regolith and rock samples, conducted experiments and traveled over 20 miles on the surface. They left behind 6 lunar landing modules, 3 lunar rovers, odd pieces of experimental equipment, lots of footprints and wheel tracks, a family photo, 2 golf balls… and the bags of human waste generated by twelve hard-working men over 13 days. It was a fascinating beginning of manned space travel and a riveting example of what hominids with brains and opposable thumbs can aspire to, given a little time. It was very odd to think about what was happening up there at the time, but that was half a century ago.

We sort of forgot. But what is likely to happen on the Moon in the very near future through the upcoming Artemis Mission(s) is making people like me think hard about important questions regarding the Moon, our Moon. It will be a very different moon.

Of what value are mystery, elegant poetry and the romance of the Moon?

Will we find ourselves asking, “What have we gone and done?”

Will we be judged responsible ancestors?

Artist and author Barnaby Porter has had a varied career in marine research, aquaculture, and woodworking, among others. Most recently he partnered with his wife Susan as co-owners of the Maine Coast Book Shop & Cafe in downtown Damariscotta. In October 2021, Barnaby completed his tenure on Coastal Rivers’ Board of Trustees after six years of service.