First Blog Entry =]

Hi!
So I'm gonna start this blog by telling you my story.
My name's Jessica and I'm sixteen. My dream is to become an astronaut.
Ireland has never had an astronaut, so if I follow my dream, I can potentially become my country's ever person to go to space ..something which would be made even more special by the fact that I'm also a female.

I suppose I should start by saying why I'm sooo obsessed with space and NASA- I honestly have no idea! I first thought it might be an interesting job when I was 11, and my teacher showed my class the movie "Apollo 13".
The adventure, discovery, excitement....it seemed like the perfect career. Sure, it would involve a LOT of hard work, physical fitness, and bravery but I'm up to the challenge :)

For a few years, I forgot about space, Apollo 13 and NASA, and I thought I might like to be a doctor or lawyer. But last year while I was babysitting and there was NOTHING on TV, I switched over to the Discovery channel and started watching a program on "Space Colonisation".
It fascinated me.

Words like "Terra-formation" and "Ares and Orion shuttles" and "Constellation mission", began circling in my head, and now I just can't stop thinking about space.

My parents and classmates, and sometimes I think even my friends, don't really offer me support with this dream of mine so I'm going to turn to you to help me. They don't think I can do it- "You're not American, you can't", "That's too much hard work for you Jessica", "Are you sure this is something you wanna do when you're older? It doesn't seem like the job for you"......

I'm sick of all the negativity, of course I can't do it if everyone is gonna put me down before I've even started??

Hopefully, someone out there will believe in me and help me reach my goal and I can support them in whatever goals they might have.

Being an astronaut is all I want to do, I can't think of any other job that I would love.
And I'm going to keep learning and developing my skills until I reach my goal.

That's all for now,
Blog soon
xo