"Star Trek" --- TOS love letters

First, for the uninitiated TOS= an abbreviation for "The Original Series"

Moving on:

To everyone who has ever loved Farscape, Babylon 5, Firefly, Stargate, (Original and Atlantean varieties,) the newer, grittier Battlestar Galactica

To the writers and directors of same.

And of course to the direct descendants of "Star Trek" the fans, writers, actors, directors of the several spinoffs....

I ask that you remember, from time to time that you wouldn't have any of the above if it weren't for Star Trek.

That's right: The outdated velour clad crew of the NCC 1701 ("No bloody "A" "B" "C" or "D").

The odd mixture of fantasy, space race militarism and hippy feel good requests to pull together and do someting right. (that often lead to horrid tv as much as it did to great stuff)
Freedom at the point of a phaser...but at least a nod and a wink towards self determination.

Without that beginning, the rest of what's been decent about genre film and TV over the last 40 years wouldn't be here.

When I hear fans of other speculative fiction written work or film or television deride it...I used to get mad, but now I just get sad.

Because all of these folks who've decided it's just too passe for them--and worse yet their children...won't decide to look at the great stuff.

How many real scientists started out as Trek fans anyway?

So, in the run up to the movie (and in part because I cannot abide that it is now "news" that Tom Cruise loves Trek... naturally because JJ Abrams is involved...)

A series of thank-you's for the work of some of the actors and writers:


The first: Leonard Nimoy.

There's been a lot written about Nimoy the actor and Spock the character. Whatever I don't rehash here, go read Nimoy's book "I Am Spock," the best part of which is it's gentle tone. He *refuses* to go nuclear on his co-workers. He came to a point where he had accepted the typecasting that hindered him as an actor.

I'm really going to focus in on his effect on this specific fan, and the effect of his signature role on this specific fan.

I was seven when I saw my first episode, one of the third season clunkers on it's original airdate.

But when I first *really paid attention* I was thirteen.

A thirteen year old girl with cerebral palsy in a chaotic household where the center of the chaos was a parent.

Here was a character who was always fighting against giving in to emotion, particularly negative emotions, even physical discomfort.

Here was a character whose entire motivation said, "Being smart is Cool." Being smart was my one E ticket ride, and Spock was the brass ring of the Best Career that could happen to a smart person, in my adolescent brain at the time.

Later as an adult, when I had to self-teach myself to "Yes, *have the meltdown* but for God's sake, do it later....," part of my template was some of the fictional character's attitude.

I cannot tell you the number of times I said to myself, in my head during a particularly painful task or surgery or movement "There is no pain," and that gave me just a bit of extra juice...to get through it.

Analysing a situation was ok. Thinking ahead was ok. The character of Spock even managed to indicate that for some race, sometime in the future...the flashes of deja-vu or intuition that I often experienced, might become a validated, cultural educatonal and nearly scientific norm: In other words, people would have the ablity of full blown telephathy....and could be taught to refine it and direct it. That was an exciting idea for a kid.

I was so interested in the character, that I began to follow the work of the actor that played Spock outside of Trek. I saw a wonderful humorous performance of Sherlock Holmes in 1975 in my hometown.

Well I grew up. And because of one of my impairments, my emotional control is *working well* because I'm following doctor's care, and for no other reason.

Things happened to me as an adult that "blew out" all my self talk to get through tough emotional states or extreme pain. It no longer worked.

But I still love the character, as well the actor's public face, the relentlessly positive, wry or humorous things I've heard Mr. Nimoy say in interviews over and over again.

Mr. Nimoy, I don't know you, and unlike those who confuse fiction and reality, I realize I only know your work.

But I thank you for that work now , because it was encouraging, fun, smart, and a real help during tough times.

When I see the movie, when the new one comes out, I'm going to act like an idiot in the theater, and stand up and give you some applause that you won't see.

Thanks. Just thanks.