American
astronaut Garrett Reisman is getting reacquainted with gravity and baseball as
he readjusts to life on Earth after three months living in space.
Reisman, 40,
is looking forward seeing his beloved
New York Yankees play the Boston Red Sox in New York on Sunday, just over
three weeks after returning on Earth following his 95-day trek to the
International Space Station (ISS).
"I'm
looking forward to coming back and having a real slice of pizza, and seeing my
friends and family in New Jersey and New York," said Reisman, a Parsippany,
N.J.-native, in a recent televised interview.
Reisman
launched to the space station in March aboard NASA's shuttle Endeavour and returned
June 14 aboard the shuttle Discovery. Despite months of weightlessness, in
which the lack of gravity leads to muscle and bone loss, the first-time
spaceflyer was well enough to walk out onto Discovery's runway and take a close
look at the spacecraft after it landed at NASA's Kennedy Space Center in
Florida.
"It's been
a relatively easy adjustment coming back home and I'm very thankful for that,"
Reisman told SPACE.com, adding that even he was surprised by his
resilience. "I was surprised. I was prepared for the worst."
Just three
days after setting foot back on terra firma, Reisman received medical clearance
to drive his car again, something he expected would take at least a month.
"It turns
out, I am somewhat of a physiological freak," he said with a laugh. "It wasn't
perfect, I was still very wobbly."
He chalked
his success up to regular exercise in space, the fact that his three-month
mission was half the length of those flown by his core Expedition 16 and
Expedition 17 crewmates and perhaps his short stature, which anecdotal evidence suggested might make a space homecoming a bit easier.
"I've been
referring to my missions as the Goldilocks flight," Reisman said in a televised
interview. "It wasn't too short and it wasn't too long."
Reisman
said he was proud to be the first Jewish long duration crewmember aboard the
space station. The distinction, he added, was short-lived since his
replacement Gregory Chamitoff of NASA is also Jewish. Reisman also worked
to reach out to people on Earth, tossing out the first pitch at a Yankees-Red
Sox game from space, appearing on the Comedy Channel's The Colbert Report
and taping a high-definition video of a day in the life aboard the station.
There's a tremendous
amount of curiosity out there of what life is like about the space station on a
very human level, on a day to day basis," he said. "I hope I was successful in
that."
During his
flight, Reisman helped to install and activate a massive
Japanese laboratory the size of a tour bus and its smaller, attic-like
storage room. He also performed one spacewalk during the mission, an excursion
that proved to among the highlights of the spaceflight. Floating in
weightlessness, was a close second, Reisman added.
"I'm a fan
of Battlestar Galactica, and I was watching that and wondering why these
people weren't floating," he told SPACE.com. "Why would you deny yourself
that?"
Reisman
said he reveled in being back home with his wife Simone and their cat Fuzzy.
"It's been
great being back home," he said, adding that little things like lounging with
his family have surprised him most. "The three of us were on the couch and I
picked up the remote and started flipping channels. It sounds like a bit of
lazy relaxation, but it felt great."
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