 What isn't a reason for Ben to want to be a rocketman?
Spacemen Die at Home By EDWARD W. LUDWIG Illustrated by THORNE One man's retreat is another's prison ... and it takes a heap of flying to make a hulk a home! How can I tell you what it's like to be young and a man and to dream of reaching the stars? Perhaps if I start at the beginning, the very beginning.... For it was June in this year of 1995, and we were the graduating class of the U. S. Academy of Interplanetary Flight. "... these boys have worked hard for six years, and now they're going to do a lot of big things. They're going to bring us the metals and minerals that we desperately need. They're going to find new land for our colonists, good rich land that will bear food and be a home for our children. And perhaps most important of all, they'll make other men think of the stars and look up at them and feel humility—for mankind needs humility." The speaker was Robert Chandler, who'd brought the first rocket down on Mars just five years ago, who'd established the first colony there, and who had just returned from his second hop to Venus. Instead of listening to his words, I was staring at his broad shoulders and his dark, crew-cut hair and his white uniform which was silk-smooth and skin-tight. I was worshiping him and hating him at the same time, for I was thinking: He's already reached Mars and Venus. Let him leave Jupiter and the others alone! My parents had died in a strato-jet crash when I was four, so I hadn't needed many of those "You are cordially invited" cards. Just one, which I'd sent to Charlie Taggart. He was a veteran of Everson's first trip to the Moon nearly twenty-five years ago, and he was still at it.
 he wanted to be the best for Laura
 he wanted to be the best for Laura  he wants to travel to unexplored places  he didn't have family to come home to  he wanted to be like Stardust Charlie