To Boldly Go

Star Trek fans are well known for being extremely obsessive creatures, going to extremes because of their love for the TV series. They imitate characters, dress in Star Trek uniforms, and are privy to the most obscure references from their TV series of choice. I consider myself a Star Trek fan, though not a Trekkie. The difference is more than a mere linguistic one. A Trekkie is a mark of status, and must be earned or bestowed by other fellow Trekkies. It means attending conventions, learning how to speak Klingon, and doing the Vulcan split finger salute.

I am hardly that obsessive, yet in many ways I have an enormous soft spot for Star Trek, particularly the Next Generation series, which I grew up watching. It must be one of the great incongruities, and such a tremendously fortunate one, that Patrick Stewart, great thespian and Shakespearean actor, plays a science fiction starship captain. It was thus tremendously heartening for me to meet S. recently, someone who shared my interest in Star Trek, and the Next Generation in particular, even admitting to watching TNG episodes when she was depressed.

While randomly surfing the net, I have found two examples of how extreme Trekkies can be in their obsession. The first is this man who turned his entire flat into something straight out of a Star Trek set complete with galley, transporter area, ship schematics, original computer display panels (LCARS to the Trekkies) after his wife left him. The attention to detail is truly stupendous, and has to be seen to be believed. The second is the group of individuals in the Hague who have decided to stage an opera - completely in Klingon.

All of this is certainly a nostalgia trip back to my own days watching Star Trek The Next Generation on late night re-runs (it was usually shown at midnighton terrestrial), reading Star Trek novelizations, particularly the hugely funny ones by Peter David, and generally believing as teenagers are wont to do, that we can "boldly go where no man has gone before".