Blue Astronaut Ornament

The Blue Astronaut Ornament is a small figure in a pale blue suit, gold stars across the chest and red trim marking the joints. Visor, gloves and boots are picked out after the body has cooled, by one painter from start to finish, because a face divided between two hands ends up looking like two people. The form is blown hollow, fitted with a metal cap, and weighted so it hangs upright instead of drifting sideways on the string. At just under four inches it is smaller than people expect and reads at that size anyway, because the blue does the work. My sister-in-law Corinne can name every crewed mission in order and does so at dinner, unprompted, working backwards from the most recent on the grounds that forward chronology is sentimental. The Royal Ontario Museum has a habit of putting the used thing in the case rather than the ceremonial one, the patched coat and the worn handle, and this particular suit has very obviously been somewhere.