Hey, Bloodshadow! Sorry to hear that your school stuff is preventing you to be active in the forum. I fear I would be in the same boat as you are now next year. I'm grade 11 right now, and I love science just as you do, though not in physics particularly. Einstein wrote in a letter saying that it is not a good idea to become a pure scientist immediately, because if you can't hand out results, you have no money, there will be the publish or perish pressure, which does no good to being a good scientist. Einstein started out working for a patenting company, perhaps you should really set eyes to the wider possibilities, there are innumerable careers related to physics. Eking out a living should come first, to become the basis that will support your dream to become a real scientist. It's good to have big dreams, but idealism gets you only so far, sometimes you got to be practical. I'm thinking about a career in Biomedical engineering, a field that pretty much mixes up all three main branches of of science into one. This career has a great prospect, it is predicted to be the fourth most in demand job in the future. so I think I'm standing on firm ground here. About light speed travel, I don't know very much, I just started physics this year, but I think as long as light speed is not infinite(which it isn't), it can be reached and exceeded, the only question is how. The reaction between anti-matter(hey that's an elements card!) and normal matter is said to be able to convert 100% of the mass of matter into energy, that is an extraordinary amount of energy. If we manage to harness this much energy, light speed travel won't be far away. But what happens after light speed travel? Even at the speed of light is still takes hundreds of years to get to another galaxy, I'm not sure how much good it will do us. I think the advances in science is coming towards its peak, just like the maximum of a parabola, it's time we change direction and learn to preserve what we have instead of infinitely looking for new things the universe can offer us. We need to learn to create our place in the universe as a sustainable existence instead of a plague that spreads on an on and eventually die along with its host. It's ok if the last part makes no sense, I just want to say I wish you good luck in life, have fun exploring the wonders of the universe. I think we have a lot in common, like strict parents. Luckily, I use a laptop and my parents don't really know what I'm doing on it most of the time.