It’s the best kind of day, and I barely know how to begin describing how I feel.<\/p>\n
Star Trek is fifty, and I\u2019m sixty-four\u2026 and I’ve been lucky enough to be able to watch this whole long story arc unfold from the start. More the point, beyond all dreams, all possibility, over the years I’ve become a little part of it. And that is so cool.<\/em><\/p>\n I remember when I first saw the description of this new show in the TV Guide in 1966. And for the quiet, geeky kid who grew up reading Robert Heinlein and Isaac Asimov and Andre Norton, it sounded almost impossibly good. When it was finally time for the show to come on, and the teaser ran, and the titles ran, I sat there completely spellbound. I can remember right here and now exactly what I felt then: amazement, and delight, and so<\/em> much excitement\u2026 because there was going to be more of this.<\/em> I didn’t know how much more\u2014but I couldn’t wait.<\/em><\/p>\n The next three years brought their ups and downs, especially when the series was almost canceled, came back, and then didn’t last beyond its third season. But the dreams it left in its wake were more than enough to keep me going for a long time. I started writing Star Trek fanfic before I knew there was such a thing. (Rarely, from now till then, have I been happier to be able to say that all that<\/em> fiction is gone forever. Believe me, some things are better lost.)<\/p>\n And though the series had died, it refused to stay quiet in the grave. First came the miracle of syndication, of reruns\u2026 for which we have to thank the foresighted Lucille Ball, Star Trek\u2019s too-often unsung fairy godmother. And then, with the reruns, came the people who loved Trek too much to let it die, and decided to stand up and do<\/em> something about it.<\/p>\n Sheer luck\u2014the happy accident of being in the right place at the right time in the early 1970\u2019s\u2014 meant I was able to be at those first great New York Star Trek conventions. At those cons I met so many terrific people, and forged connections that were about to start having a profound effect on the rest of my life. Because of Star Trek I found a skilled and endlessly committed mentor for my writing (and a good friend too). Because of Star Trek I started finding my voice as a writer. Because of Star Trek, I got published and was nominated for awards. Because of Star Trek\u2026 I started writing Star Trek.<\/p>\n And that <\/em>was genuinely kind of unexpected. But I still bless the day when (while reading someone else\u2019s Trek novel) I got so annoyed with what they were doing that I threw the poor book at the wall and declared, in the full of my writerly arrogance, “I could eat a ream of typing paper and barf<\/em> a better Star Trek novel than this!”<\/p>\n And if something like this actually happened eventually\u2014without my even having to actually eat the paper\u2014it was because I wasn\u2019t at all concerned about looking better than that other writer, but seriously concerned with doing better Star Trek.<\/em> In retrospect, judging from my mailbag, it seems like I may have succeeded at this at least once or twice (or maybe more). That\u2019s honor enough for me. I\u2019m delighted and humbled to be counted among the number of the many gifted people who find serving the same purpose\u2014making better Star Trek\u2014to be both privilege and pleasure.<\/p>\n Many amazing things have happened along this journey. I met my husband of (now) thirty years because of Star Trek. I co-wrote a Star Trek novel with him on our honeymoon. More or less accidentally, I ascended to possibly the peak of achievement for a nursing professional and cured Dr McCoy (or, all right, DeForest Kelley, just as you prefer\u2026) of a sore throat. I\u2019ve heard Leonard Nimoy speak words I\u2019d written for him. I\u2019ve seen George Takei eat my husband\u2019s cooking (and go back for seconds, and thirds: but then George is a perceptive guy).* I’ve had the honor to be walked through other <\/em>people’s Star Trek books, specifically and especially one by the wonderful John M. Ford\u2014one of the best of all Star Trek writers, and taken from us far too soon. Over the years I’ve met and been befriended by amazing names, both people who\u2019ve written for the shows or the films, and people who\u2019ve acted in them\u2014open and warmhearted people all endlessly devoted to bringing joy to the viewers and readers who’re also in love with this particular universe. They know how lucky they are to be able to contribute again and again to something so big, and so loved, and so meaningful.<\/p>\n Such contribution isn\u2019t always easy, and doesn\u2019t always go the way you wish it might. Naturally Trek hasn\u2019t always been perfect. Crass reality has more than occasionally gotten in the way of the storytelling. Trek\u2019s been jerked around by interoffice politics and all-too-human blindness and people besotted by money and power, and has been beset by plain old misunderstanding of the basic concept\u2014exploration, discovery, diversity, delight in the different. Sometimes something goes wrong with the storytelling, and parts of the puzzle just don\u2019t quite fit together, or look bad when viewed later. In the Star Trek universe as in the real one, entropy is running and no matter how you try, you can’t win \u2018em all. But the times when Trek does<\/em> get it right (in my opinion) far outnumber the times when it doesn\u2019t, because the people working on it are aware that they have a certain level of excellence to match, and a well-established, much-loved vision to evoke and sustain.<\/p>\n In this regard, over the years I’ve been asked as often as anybody else working in this universe, \u201cWhat is<\/em> it that makes Trek so special, and why is this particular vision so evocative? Why<\/em> does it appeal to people so?\u201d There are a hundred possible answers, but mine is simple and clear. I\u2019m a member of the last US generation that was asked to believe, as kids in school, that hiding under your desk would actually protect you in some way from a nuclear bomb. The aura of hopelessness and terror that hung over the Cold War period for many of us was powerfully opposed by what Star Trek seemed to be saying from the very beginning: that humanity would get through this, that we would get past it\u2014and that human beings were, actually, better than this, if we would just allow ourselves to act<\/em> as if we were.<\/p>\n And this message seems still to work for subsequent generations introduced to Trek. Despite the terrors of the present\u2014 which are by no means to be dismissed\u2014Star Trek did a lot in its earliest generations to dispel some of the terrors of the past. I firmly believe that if Trek is written with what Harlan Ellison calls \u201cclean hands and composure\u201d, it will continue to do the same in the future. Storytellers who come to Trek meaning to serve the vision of human exploration and compassion honestly will, in my opinion, do so even more successfully than they might expect.<\/p>\n It\u2019s my sense that the longer story lasts, the stronger it gets. Well-loved universes and the stories told in them, I think, have a way of furthering and protecting themselves. From the very beginning there has always been so much love and hope and enthusiasm surrounding Star Trek, the stories it tells, the people who tell the stories, and the people who act the stories, that it has become much stronger with time than it was when it started\u2014tougher to kill and quicker to bounce back from failure, and not just because of the financial opportunities involved.<\/p>\n Every new generation of Star Trek will inevitably have its own difficulties, its own exigencies, its places where things go very wrong or seem to. But I strongly believe that there is something about this particular vision of the future\u2014of a<\/em> future, of a future that works because people are consciously working<\/em> on making it work\u2014that means it will just keep on coming back. The power of the vision and the stories that have lasted this long and keep getting refined and expanded is not to be dismissed, not to be discounted. Yes, story can sometimes wither and die young if its roots don’t delve deep enough. But there is something about Star Trek’s roots that seems to have delved very deep.<\/p>\n Since everybody else will probably be saying better, smarter and more clearly articulated things about Star Trek today than I\u2019m likely to be able to, I want to wind this up and go read what they\u2019re saying. But backtracking briefly to the personal end of things, I can say there are very few parts of my life\u2014professional, personal, emotional\u2014that Star Trek has not touched and will not continue to. For those who were going to ask the inevitable question: yes, I do<\/em> have one more Star Trek novel in me. I have my own universes to tend to at the moment, but I really do need to get in touch with whoever\u2019s handling Trek at Pocket Books and see if they can work me in sometime in the next year or three. Because some of the very best times of my life have been spent standing (in imagination) on the bridge of that starship… working out what happens next, and what the person sitting in that center seat will do. And the next-best times have been spent seeing Enterprise<\/em> pass by low overhead\u2014on the home screen or in the theater\u2014and feeling that old familiar shiver of awe and hunger and delight go down my spine. To me she<\/em> will always be Star Trek\u2019s biggest character, and of all of them, my favorite.<\/p>\n In the meantime, to all the many friends and acquaintances\u2014there are so many of you, too many to name\u2014whose paths have crossed mine in the service or enjoyment of Star Trek, I just want you to know that I\u2019m thinking of you today, with affection and so much gratitude. You’ve made my life, as Trek has, a better and happier place. Without Star Trek I couldn’t be many things I am. And I can’t wait to see what comes of all our work next, and where it goes now. That particular frontier\u2014not all<\/em> that final, after all\u2014just keeps stretching out further and further ahead of us, and looking more and more interesting all the time.<\/p>\n Fifty years\u2026 Early this morning I thought, \u201cYou know, with medicine being what it is these days, it\u2019s not completely<\/em> beyond belief that I might see Trek turn one hundred.\u201d But whether I do or not, some of you will<\/em> see it. I wonder what those celebrations will look like, a bit; and (just a little) I envy you.<\/p>\n \u2026But only<\/em> a little. My job as a Trek writer is after all to look ahead\u2014one of my favorite parts of the job (besides keeping company with one of the most extraordinary casts of characters ever devised). So for the moment, let\u2019s concentrate on enjoying and celebrating the first fifty years of Star Trek. The next half-century can wait\u2026 but only until tomorrow.<\/p>\n *BTW, will somebody please have George tweet me at @dduane? I just remembered that I promised him that recipe. \ud83d\ude42<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" It’s the best kind of day, and I barely know how to begin describing how I feel. Star Trek is fifty, and I\u2019m sixty-four\u2026 and I’ve been lucky enough to…<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":4382,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_lmt_disableupdate":"","_lmt_disable":"","activitypub_content_warning":"","activitypub_content_visibility":"","activitypub_max_image_attachments":4,"activitypub_interaction_policy_quote":"","activitypub_status":"","footnotes":""},"categories":[772,762,633],"tags":[778],"class_list":["post-4381","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-science-fiction","category-star-trek","category-tv-and-film","tag-star-trek-at-50"],"yoast_head":"\n