Roman's Routine
Roman starts each day by climbing out of this item he sleeps in.
A sleeping bag
During a nine-month mission, astronauts complete about this many hours of morning exercise.
540 hours
Looking down, Roman spots these two South African cities "locked together like a binary star".
Johannesburg and Pretoria
This Spanish artist painted Las Meninas.
Diego Velazquez
This astronaut tells the crew her mother has died.
Chie
To begin hin mornings, Roman swims in the dark towards this location.
The lab window.
4,320 sunrises and 4,320 sunsets
The astronauts often compare Earth to this nurturing figure.
A mother.
In the painting, the king and queen appear only in this object.
A mirror.
When Chie shares the news, Shaun lets go of this food item, letting it float away.
Noodles
Roman has spend this many total days in space across his missions.
434
In one nine-month mission, astronauts travel nearly this many miles.
108 million miles
From space, the Earth's brief dawn arrives approximately this often.
Every 90 minutes.
To Shaun at fifteen, the lesson on Las Meninas seemed like this-he thought it was meaningless.
A futility.
Pietro comforts Chie with this seamless gesture.
Taking her hands.
Why does Roman add the eighty-eighth line to his tally?
To try to tether time to something countable.
Roman has this many changes of T-shirts for his mission.
36
Shaun recognizes Karachi at night because it resembles these sketches from his school days.
Geometric doodles.
Shaun's wife gave him a postcard of Las Meninas because it represented this moment in their youth.
Their first exchange.
After Chie's loss, the astronauts see Earth as this kind of hopeful place.
Heaven (or an afterlife)
To anchor time in orbit, ground crews instruct astronauts to keep this kind of daily record.
A tally.
Roman circles the Earth this many times each day.
16
After Chie's mother dies, the crew reflects on this celestial body as the only mother she has left.
Earth
Shaun's wife rewrote their teacher's analysis of the painting on the postcard while he was trining in this country.
Russia
The crew reflects that in orbit there may be no truly new thoughts-just these kinds of thoughts reborn.
Old thoughts in new moments.