Planet Earth Is Blue

Going to the moon became Nova and Bridget’s favorite way to distract themselves from their life’s painful realities; the moon thus symbolizes safety for Nova. On the day that Nova and Bridget were removed from their mother’s custody, the girls hid in a closet, pretending that they were blasting off to the moon. Just as their mother pled with the social worker not to “take [her] girls,” Bridget told her sister, “We made it, Nova […] We’re safe now. We’ve just landed” (44). In this way, Bridget made Nova feel safe, protected, and cared for and encouraged Nova’s dreams of space travel. Rather than associating it with fear or potential loss, despite the lyrics of her favorite song, “Space Oddity,” Nova began to connect space travel with comfort and security because it links her to Bridget.

Bridget’s associations with the moon are a bit different because she used the dream of space travel to escape her problems. Nova knows that escape is important to Bridget, who insisted that they would enact several escapes together: first New Hampshire, then America, and finally the planet. Bridget told Nova, “In outer space, surrounded by stars, there’s no social worker to separate us” (88), nor are there any of the other upsetting things they’ve had to face on Earth.