 What isn't a reason for Ben to want to be a rocketman?
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? For it was June in this year of 1995, and we were the graduating class of the U. S. Academy of Interplanetary Flight. They're going to bring us the metals and minerals that we desperately need. 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." 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. He was a veteran of Everson's first trip to the Moon nearly twenty-five years ago, and he was still at it. I remembered how, as a kid, I'd pestered him in the Long Island Spaceport, tagging after him like a puppy, and how he'd grown to like me until he became father, mother, and buddy all in one to me. And I remembered, too, how his recommendation had finally made me a cadet. The Universe was mighty big, but with two of us to face it together, it would be only half as big. They expect us to make a new kind of civilization and a better place out of Earth.
 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