-8

i remember star trek
before i went out with annemarie i acted as a babysitter to her kid. for several thursdays i would go over to her place and entertain the kid while she went off and did her evening classes.
now i have always been a fan of star trek, well classic star trek i was never keen on next gen – it was too serious. there was something about kirk, spock and mccoy that always appealed. during my junior school days we would play at star trek which would involve us running around, shooting our phasers and having mock fights. oddly this was how we also played hawaii 5-0 and the high chaparral.
while i liked star trek i could never been considered to be a trekkie or a trekker, though it was a close run thing as i did start down the road of being one of them. for me it was a great tv programme that was science fiction and i did love my science fiction.
anyway back to that thursday evening.
i arrived to look after the kid. annemarie leaving to go to class.
it was a winter’s evening. cold and dark outside. his best friend was away so it was a lego night. i had the tv on so i could watch star trek… these are the voyages of the starship enterprise. he was making something or another with lego and babbling about something or another. i was doing that adult thing of pretending to pay attention while watching the tv.
needless to say it was an episode that i had already seen before, that was beside the point i still enjoyed watching it. it was another one where kirk would save the day.
i tried to get the kid interested in the tv; he just ignored it because his lego craft had grown to critical mass.
it just so happened that once star trek finished on bbc2 street hawk was starting on itv. street hawk just happened to be one of the kid’s favourite shows (no doubt he played at it when he was in school). the tv was turned over just in time to catch the credits of street hawk.
lego was put down.
babbling stopped.
attention on the tv.
dead quiet.
he watched and watched.
the first ad break came and he turned to me: “i don’t like star trek it is all made up. street hawk is real and is the brother of airwolf and knight rider.”
there was little i could say to that.
(many years later – long after i had stopped seeing annemarie i was contacted by her she wanted to know if i could get the kid tickets to see the new star trek movie. i could. i did. i felt like my mission had been completed).