Mars. Photo by Eric Stevens.

This isn’t the worst photo I’ve ever taken, but it’s certainly the worst I’ve ever shared on this site.

But it’s still kind of beautiful. A tiny orange dot on the display of my camera, too small to see through the viewfinder, is an entire planet. It’s over 40 million miles away, but we’ve sent things there – multiple times. Someday, not that long from now, we’re going to send a human being, willing to sacrifice their own life on a one-way trip to an orange desert.

Standing in the middle of South Union Street in Rochester, NY, a tiny red dot made me feel small.

(For photography nerds, I used a 500mm lens with a 2x converter. For space nerds, please don’t tell me I actually shot the top of a water tower or something.)