Share a Star Trek Memory for the 50th Anniversary!
Star Trek has been with me my whole life and I’m better for it. On the 50th anniversary of the franchise, let’s all share some memories of Star Trek’s influence on us.
Above anything else growing up, I knew I was a “geek” because I loved Star Trek. I also knew no one else outside my family talked about it. So I kept a pretty low profile until the sixth grade when a new pal at school mentioned The Next Generation. We became best friends after that, obviously.
Oddly enough, I’ve only been to one Trek convention in my life but I did visit a pretty cool exhibit a few years back (where that top image is from) and got to eat at the Star Trek restaurant in Las Vegas while it was still around (where a Klingon flirted with me by telling me how wonderful my smooth forehead was).
I’ll have a video going up on HitFix later today where I share some more Trek memories but thought it might be nice if we all got int he comments and talked about our love of the franchise. Take it away!
Favorite Star Trek memories… well, my only foray into slash was a couple of TNG stories many years ago; that’s a fond memory. ;-)
Like others, I really love the show’s optimistic take on the evolution of human culture into something better, rather than worse, especially since so much science fiction has been based on the latter rather than the former.
And lastly, we here in Portland were blessed with five years of “Trek in the Park”, live action re-enactments of some of the best TOS episodes by a talented local troupe, that ended a few years ago (it was always intended as “five year mission”). “Space Seed” was the first of those I saw, and while changing none of the dialogue or action, they really conveyed just how much subtext of various sorts was in that episode. I certainly never caught that as a kid, but it was delight to watch and realize how much was going on there.
I watched a lot of TNG as a kid, and one of my most vivid memories is of how deeply disappointed I was to taste Earl Grey tea for the first time. It was gross, and I couldn’t understand why Picard would like it so much. It was an early lesson in accepting that your heroes aren’t perfect people.
I don’t really have tons of Star Trek memories since even though I’ve tried getting into the series it still has never really grabbed me. Though I did enjoy going to the reboot movies with my mom, who is a big Trek fan (but I don’t think she’d consider herself a Trekkie)
But, one weird Trek memory I have was the first time we went to Germany we wound up going on a river cruise on the Rhine. The river boat we were on was called The Enterprise and the interior was designed to look futuristic and reminiscent of The Enterprise from ST. Though I don’t think it had any official connection to the Star Trek brand. Also, on the second level of the boat they had a small arcade area so that’s where my brother, my cousins, and I went to hang out for most of the ride after we had lunch.
Trek’s vision of the future has become my de facto religion. It’s hard to suss out any one memory, but I can tell you the moment I went from an average fan into a devoted one. I had been recording on VHS and watching the DS9 episodes since the series premiered, but it was at First Contact, when I kept thinking “it’s gotta be the Vulcans,” and the Vulcans come out of the craft and the humans group together. That music playing, that moment crystallized into probably the most powerful religious experience I ever had, combined with Picard’s description of the future to Lily. Lily was us, the viewers. She was our window into this future.
Live long and prosper!
I only got into star trek recently, a little before the first reboot movie, I’d been watching BSG and wanted to check out the original. I don’t really have a lot of memories from my childhood associated with Star Trek, idk if it wasn’t on or was too niche or what, but I never had anymore than a passing association with it till I decided to go look it up, cause what kind of sci-fi fan are you if you haven’t seen star trek?
I expected it to be cheesy and silly, like Doctor Who, and was surprised at how good it is, even through modern eyes. I still haven’t gotten around to seen all of star trek, just TOS, a couple of seasons of TNG plus all the movies, but I am a fan.
I love how it is all about diversity and peace, exploring and learning, it’s wonderful.
One of my favorite Trek memories is meeting George Takei at a free, fan-run event (wow, remember those?!?) circa 1986 and having him thank me, personally, for being a Star Trek fan. Yes, he has probably said that thousands, millions, of times… but it sounded so sincere, and with that great smile he has – I will never forget it. I wrote a blog post about it for the 45th anniversary (five more years gone already?!) – http://thescifichristian.com/2011/09/a-sulu-thank-you-happy-45th-birthday-star-trek/