I have to admit that I am a rather peripheral follower of space shuttle missions. I tend to find myself hoping that all goes well and nothing bad happens on these missions, as I have lived through two shuttle disasters. However, this week, I find that I've been paying far more attention to Lisa Nowak, who was on the crew of the Discovery last July. She seemed such a bright, capable crew member, personable; pictures of her on the shuttle show her sitting like a genie in zero gravity, a huge smile on her face, her joy at being on a shuttle mission so apparent.
All I can say about her latest appearance in the news is, "What happened?" and "Was this guy worth ruining your life and career?" Apparently, on Monday, February 5th, after driving 900 miles from Houston to Orlando, Lisa Nowak confronted Colleen Shipman, an apparent rival for the affections of a fellow astronaut, spraying her with pepper spray in a remote parking lot. Law enforcement speculated that there is a highly reasonable certainty that Nowak was going to kill Shipman, based on the fact that Nowak was carrying, among other things, pepper spray, a steel mallet, a buck knife, and rubber tubing in a duffel bag. Nowak has been released on bail, is now subject to a restraining order, is wearing a GPS ankle monitor, and has lost custody (I believe temporarily) of her three children. Unbelievably, during her 900-mile drive, Nowak peed into diapers so she wouldn't have to stop and make a bathroom break (she was determined to meet Shipman's plane and "talk to her" about her relationship with the other astronaut). Apparently, astronauts on the Shuttle are accustomed to using adult diapers during launch, re-entry, and on spacewalks. This has been made fun of in a lot of the media, but I find this detail strange and sad, an emblem of this woman's plummet from mission specialist on the shuttle to a crazed mission of her own devising.
It's very hard to connect the two pictures I keep seeing of Nowak--her official NASA portrait, where she looks healthy, fit, bright-eyed, radiant, the very picture of physical and mental health, and her arrest photos, where she looks like she's been on a meth run (I am not saying she was doing meth--she just looks so physically wasted, like those horrible "Faces of Meth" pictures on law enforcement websites, with stick arms and a drawn, pinched face, and dull eyes--she literally looks fifteen years older than her NASA portrait). The physical change in just a few months--Nowak was on the shuttle crew in July 2006--makes me wonder if she's had some sort of bizarre manic episode.
None of these speculations excuses Nowak's actions, though--she certainly terrorized the other woman, and I think the charges Nowak is facing are highly appropriate. Still, I wonder about ongoing mental illness in this case, maybe some incipient problem finally triggered by the stresses of the shuttle mission, the letdown after coming back to Earth and ordinary life (that must be a huge adjustment), and Nowak's recent breakup with her husband.
I go back and forth between the two pictures of this woman, so bright and accomplished-looking in one, so sad and dull-eyed in the other, and just wonder about what has been going on in her mind since her shuttle mission. I find myself being shocked by her crime on one hand, and also hoping that she will get some sort of treatment for whatever is troubling her--because I don't think that just being scorned by some guy is the real problem here. I guess I still have a naive picture of astronauts being a lot stronger and more "together" somehow that most folks, but I suppose they can break down like the rest of us. This is a tragic example on all sides of the story.
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