Do you know what a meteorite is? It’s a rock that flies through space and falls to earth on our planet Earth. And this story is about one such meteorite.
One space rock disconnected from the others and flew through space. It wasn’t easy. It’s very dark in space, so it couldn’t see much. But that changed when it flew past a constellation. The stars lit its path and he could see beautiful clouds between the stars. The flying rock couldn’t help but marvel at the beauty and immediately thought, “The universe is so beautiful. The stars are beautiful as they shine, the clouds are beautifully colored, only I am just an ordinary ugly stone.”
And so the space rock flew on, worrying very much on the way. It wanted to be beautiful and important too. Instead, it thought it was just a space junk. Then he saw the Milky Way galaxy in the distance. It was beautiful, and had a very pretty sun and so many pretty planets that the curious little rock turned a little to get a closer look at the splendor.
But it was a long journey and the rock was getting tired.
“I’ll choose the most beautiful planet and stay there,” the rock decided.
He flew past two frozen planets, but it was too cold there. They were too far from the sun.
The rock flew on, but it didn’t like the other planets either. Until he saw a blue planet with green islands. It was the planet Earth.
“Gee, it’s so pretty!” wondered the rock, and as he was leaning over to see better, the planet Earth pulled him close. And so the space rock hurtled towards the ground of planet Earth.
It was nighttime on Earth. People were asleep, except for four curious eyes looking out the window at the stars. They belonged to two children, a brother and a sister, Marty and Emily.
“Look, there’s a shooting star over there,” Marty was pointing to Emily.
“Oh, it’s beautiful. How pretty it shines. Do you know what to do when you see a shooting star?” Emily asked.
“Make a wish.”
“Sure, but you can’t say it out loud or it won’t come true.”
“Should I wish it wouldn’t fall on my head?” Marty teased his sister.
“You go on, you little dummy, and don’t disturb me, or I won’t be able to make a wish,” Emily admonished him, then closed her eyes, clasped her hands together, and whispered: “Please, please, please!”
The meteorite, which was plummeting to the ground, heard the chatter of the two children. Suddenly it was overjoyed. They thought he was beautiful and important because he would make their wishes come true. The little rock decided to return the favor. As it fell to the ground, it got smaller and smaller, not even visible in the sky anymore, and then suddenly it cracked and split into two tiny fragments. And the fragments fell to the ground near the town where the two children lived.
The next afternoon, when the children were going for a walk after school, a strange thing happened.
“Hey, Marty, look what I found,” cried Emily, showing Marty a strange pebble, about the size of a fingernail.
“Look, Emily, I found one like that too.”
The children searched the ground for a long time to see if they could find another pebble like it, but they didn’t. Marty and Emily hid their pebbles for good luck. And believe me, they did bring them luck. But they never thought it was their shooting star.
