Indeed, I do love Shakespeare, and I happily finished an entry or two about why, and then I was reading diaries, and came across marn's entry about going to see the newest Star Trek movie with her husband.Oooh. Star Trek. (Imagine Homer Simpson drooling.)
I really love Star Trek. Let me state unequivocally, however, that I have never gone to a Star Trek convention dressed as someone from another planet. (Not that there's anything wrong with that.) I have, however, been to two Star Trek conventions.
Why, why Star Trek? I watched it in the 60s, but so did a lot of people. I didn't cry when it went off the air (like I did with Howdy Doody), I moved on. When I lived in the dorm at college, ST was in its first round of syndication, and like everyone else, I had dinner each night at 4:30 so we could all be back in the Lounge to watch ST at 5. It was a bonding thing.
Then I was in Manhattan one day with my roommate and we passed a store that sold ST stuff. Imagine; whoever heard of such a thing?
I bought a tribble.
I began to develop a reputation in the family as the local Trekkie. Hubs, who, as it turns it, is as into this as I ever was, played it cool and let everyone think I was the weirdo. Whenever it was on, though, he watched it with me.
Then there was this new show, "Star Trek: The Next Generation". I didn't have high hopes, but of course I would watch. What was with that bald English guy for a captain, anyway? I watched, I wasn't impressed. Hubs watched too, and then we started to realize that this was good. It was very good. We started taping every episode, because it was very, very good.
I still didn't get the captain, and it was obviously the first officer who was the designated hunk. Once, about halfway through the second season, I had a dream, an actual dream, about Commander Riker and the Captain beaming down somewhere or other; it was like watching an episode in my sleep. Waking up, I came to an amazing conclusion: Commander Riker, yes, fine. Captain Picard? Oh my god. This bald English guy -- he is very fine.
So now I'm watching every episode, videotaping, and salivating. And Hubs is right there, and seems to be amused, so that's okay. But now we're both getting into Star Trek, and we're starting to see that it's actually having impact on our view of the world and such. One of the big ST things is the Prime Directive, which says that it's not okay to interfere with any other life forms. And then Hubs turns into a vegan. Coincidence? I think not. In my house, the philosophy of the Star Trek universe seems to make a lot of sense.
So we went to a convention in NYC, and as we entered the hotel from the street, 2 Klingons in full armor walked out past us. The truth. Onto the New York City streets.
I went to another convention a year or two later with Old Friend, since Hubs said one was enough for him. But I had to go to this one: Patrick Stewart (Captain Picard, of course) was speaking. So I saw him in person, oh my.
I have actually seen him perform twice since then, both on Broadway. Hubs did go along on these jaunts; he says now that if I go to see Patrick Stewart in person, he goes with me to keep me from hurling myself onto the stage. Once we sat in the first row, which was incredible, and then, all my dreams came true and I saw him in "The Tempest". Shakespeare and Captain Picard, can't top that.
So this is more my Patrick Stewart entry than my Star Trek entry. Even so, one parting tale:
We really did watch an awful lot of Star Trek as the kids were growing up; they saw more of the Enterprise crew than they did of a lot of their relatives. One day we were driving along in the car, and on the radio news they said something about the Immigration Service putting into effect some new rules about amnesty for illegal aliens. I barely heard it, but when I looked in the rearview mirror, I saw two little girls with huge, wondering eyes.
Ah, Trek.
