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I'm an astronaut.

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I flew on the space shuttle twice,

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and I lived on the International
Space Station for almost six months.

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People often ask me the same question,
which is, "What's it like in space?"

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as if it was a secret.

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Space belongs to all of us,

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and I'd like to help you understand why
it's a place that is magic for all of us.

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The day after my 50th birthday,

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I climbed aboard a Russian capsule,

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in Russia,

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and launched into space.

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Launching is the most
dangerous thing that we do,

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and it's also the most thrilling.

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Three, two, one ... liftoff!

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I felt every single bit of the controlled
fury of those rocket engines

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as they blasted us off the Earth.

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We went faster and faster and faster,

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until, after eight and a half minutes,
on purpose, those engines stop --

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kabunk! --

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and we are weightless.

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And the mission and the magic begin.

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Dmitry and Paolo and I
are circling the Earth

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in our tiny spacecraft,

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approaching the space station carefully.

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It's an intricate dance
at 17,500 miles an hour

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between our capsule,
the size of a Smart Car,

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and the space station,
the size of a football field.

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We arrive when those two craft dock
with a gentle thunk.

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We open the hatches,

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have sloppy zero-G hugs with each other,

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and now we're six.

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We're a space family, an instant family.

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My favorite part about living up there

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was the flying.

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I loved it.

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It was like being Peter Pan.

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It's not about floating.

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Just the touch of a finger

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can actually push you across
the entire space station,

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and then you sort of
tuck in with your toes.

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One of my favorite things
was drifting silently

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through the space station,

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which was humming along at night.

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I wondered sometimes
if it knew I was there,

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just silent.

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But sharing the wonder
of that with the crew

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was also part of what was important to me.

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A typical day in space
starts with the perfect commute.

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I wake up, cruise down the lab

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and say hello to the best
morning view ever.

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It's a really fast commute,
only 30 seconds,

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and we never get tired
of looking out that window.

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I think it reminds us that we're
actually still very close to Earth.

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Our crew was the second ever
to use the Canadian robotic arm

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to capture a supply ship
the size of a school bus

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containing about a dozen
different experiments

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and the only chocolate that we would see
for the next four months.

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Now, chocolate aside,
every single one of those experiments

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enables yet one more
scientific question answered

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that we can't do down here on Earth.

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And so, it's like a different lens,

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allowing us to see the answers
to questions like,

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"What about combustion?"

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"What about fluid dynamics?"

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Now, sleeping is delightful.

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My favorite -- I mean, you could be
upside down, right side up --

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my favorite: curled up
in a little ball and floating freely.

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Laundry? Nope.

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We load our dirty clothes
into an empty supply ship

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and send it off into space.

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The bathroom.

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Everyone wants to know.

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It's hard to understand,
so I made a little video,

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because I wanted kids to understand

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that the principle of vacuum saves the day

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and that just a gentle breeze
helps everything go

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where it is supposed to.

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Well, in real life it does.

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(Laughter)

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Recycling? Of course.

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So we take our urine, we store it,
we filter it and then we drink it.

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And it's actually delicious.

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(Laughter)

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Sitting around the table,

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eating food that looks bad
but actually tastes pretty good.

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But it's the gathering around
the table that's important,

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I think both in space and on Earth,

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because that's what cements
a crew together.

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For me, music was a way to stay connected
to the rest of the world.

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I played a duet between Earth and space

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with Ian Anderson of Jethro Tull

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on the 50th anniversary
of human spaceflight.

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Connecting to family was so important.

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I talked with my family almost every day
the whole time I was up there,

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and I would actually read books to my son
as a way for us just to be together.

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So important.

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Now, when the space station
would go over Massachusetts,

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my family would run outside,

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and they would watch the brightest star
sailing across the sky.

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And when I looked down,
I couldn't see my house,

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but it meant a lot to me to know
that the people I loved the most

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were looking up while I was looking down.

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So the space station, for me, is the place
where mission and magic come together.

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The mission, the work are vital steps

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in our quest to go further than our planet

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and imperative for understanding
sustainability here on Earth.

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I loved being a part of that,

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and if I could have taken
my family with me,

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I never would have come home.

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And so my view from the station showed me

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that we are all from the same place.

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We all have our roles to play.

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Because, the Earth is our ship.

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Space is our home.

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And we are the crew of Spaceship Earth.

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Thank you.

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(Applause)