Last Friday, the internet and my workplace lit up with the news that Leonard Nimoy, the actor who played the iconic character of Spock, had died, of COPD. Unlike the passing of other celebrities and stars, Nimoy’s passing hit me deeply. And as the condolences and memories about his life and work filled my feeds, I began to reflect on my own long love of both the actor, and his wonderful character, Mr. Spock.

It’s probably hard for some to remember that people often got the Vulcan confused with another Spock, a baby doctor by the name of Benjamin Spock. I soon learned about the depth of a writer’s interest and understanding of the character when they called him “Doctor” instead of “Mister”. My Spock was Mister. Or Commander. Or, for a while, Captain. But even the honorifc “Mr.” was eventually dropped as Dr. Spock faded into obscurity, and Mr. Spock became a global icon.

I was in kindergarten when the show first aired. I might had seen an episode or two- I have memories of seeing a strange-looking man on our black and white Curtis-Mathis, and wondering why his eyebrows looked like that. I remember seeing an episode at my grandparents house on their new color TV, with a cousin who thought it was fun to turn the tint controls to where everyone looked orange, like Oompa-Loompas. And I remember seeing the show on Japanese television, with Japanese voices dubbed over the actors voices. Spock was “Supoku”. Bonanza was also in Japanese.

Spock hovered in the background of those years that we moved- from Washington state, to Texas, then Okinawa, then Japan, and finally to Arkansas. By then, it was the early 70s, and the local network put on reruns of Star Trek in the afternoons. I’d come home from school, and watch. I was hooked. There was that strange-looking pointy-eared guy again, played by the actor with the strange name that no one knew how to properly pronounce. The more I watched, the more I liked him. Around that time, the animated series aired, and Star Trek books and merchandise began to trickle out. I started mowing yards and babysitting to earn money for the purchase of the Blish novels, the early Starlog mags, and the Meco characters. Meco’s Spock figure was a handsome little guy with a non-plussed expression. I liked to perch him on the stereo while I dubbed tapes. My father teased me about him, and called him my “TV teddy bear”. Mom called him “Spook”, or “Spockie-poo”. I ignored the razzing.

Spock was my hero- a perfect role model for a brainy, geeky, socially awkward young teen. I was relentlessly bullied in school, and hid behind books a lot of the time. I had a hard time understanding the unspoken social code that all my peers seemed to absorb naturally. Being the military kid in a civilian school in the Bible Belt was extremely difficult. If I wasn’t being questioned about my religious piety, I was being made fun of for my dress, my accent, my bookishness, and anything else they could think of. I was the outsider, the alien. Spock was my shield. Emulating his behavior and reactions became a way for me to cope with the difficulties of being the awkward stranger. I adored Spock. He was elegant and graceful, with a calm, velvety voice and a piercing gaze that was both difficult to meet, and impossible to ignore. His expression was solemn most of the time, but his upswept eyebrows and pensive frowns signaled his deeper moods. He was rational, but passionate, sexy, but not aggressively so. He was comfortably masculine- his warrior side was not the swaggering macho sort, but more the understated power of an Aikido master. He did everything with a spare grace that I struggled to emulate. His beautiful hands were immaculate, and I stopped chewing my own nails so mine might look so good.

I wondered what it would be like to be in the company of someone like him- someone not given to small talk, joking around, gossip or teasing. I hated all of those, because they were difficult for me to understand. He simply disregarded them, and didn’t care if he seemed rude because of it. He was his own person. I wondered what it would be like to be his friend, and how one would do so. Was it possible? I wrote stories- fanfic, sort of, about befriending him, and getting to know him. They were awful, but they served a purpose for me, helping me to game real life situations, and find my footing as a young woman. I didn’t want to be his girlfriend- I wanted to be him.

My high school journalism teacher knew I liked Spock. He asked people to reveal who their heroes were for an issue of the school paper. He wanted me to write about Spock, but I chose not to mention the Vulcan, because I knew that I would catch hell if anyone knew how much I loved him. But even though I didn’t say anything, Spock’s image was among the collage of pictures that illustrated the article. I might not have said anything about Spock, but there he was, gazing up at me from the page, quietly encouraging me.

I decided that I had to leave home after I was denied permission to go to a local Star Trek convention. I had begged for months, had the modest fee for admission, and was even told that I could go, only to be told on the day that no, I couldn’t go, because I had to work at my parents’ store. Gene Roddenberry himself was there, and I wanted to mingle with other people who liked the show. The fall after I graduated high school, I left home, and joined the USAF, against my father’s wishes. In a way, my deviation from my father’s plans for me (he wanted me to go to nursing school) paralleled Spock’s own split from his family and alienation from his father. Joining the USAF (and Starfleet!) got us both out of toxic environments and away from overbearing parents.

The Air Force was both the best and the worst of times for me. I became a skilled electronics technician, and lived overseas for 8 years. But I suffered from the deeply embedded sexism and prejudice against women that was part of the job. I moved to several bases, and at each base, I dodged the would-be Romeos, and quickly found my fellow geeks and Trekkies, and fell in with them. I went to Star Trek conventions, learned about fanzines, met fellow Spock fans, and collected some wonderful items. For my 21st birthday, I was gifted with a cloth and latex sculpture of Spock in meditation, wearing his beautiful black robe. And I had one made for myself, winning several costume contests with it. Star Trek, and Spock, made life bearable, in spite of my suffering from major depression for most of my time in service.

Star Trek: The Motion Picture came out while I was in Basic Training. The training instructor found out I was a fan, and ordered me down to the dayroom to watch a news article on TV about the premiere of the film. That movie was the first one I saw when I got permission to go off base in Tech School. I was in California when “Wrath of Khan” came out- and I cried, like many others, at Spock’s death. When the film came out on VHS, we had a viewing party, and one friend wrapped most of a roll of toilet paper around my eyes when that scene came up. And I found myself swanning around New Orleans’ Jackson Square in my meditation robe with friends in ’84 when Search for Spock came out. No one batted an eye.

Spock accompanied me all over the world. He became a shibboleth for me to identify fellow Trekkies, and a signal of trustworthiness to fellow outliers, as well. In Germany, one of my gay colleagues came out to me, because he trusted me to keep his secret. I bearded him when the scrutiny got too close. The military automatically threw out such people back then- this was well before “Don’t Ask, Don’t Tell” was a factor. But in Germany, I also got to know German fans of the show, who adored Nimoy, but couldn’t get him to come to any of their conventions.

And it was on route to Germany where I finally ran into my hero in person. I had a long layover at an airport wait for a charter flight back to Ramstein. To pass the time, I headed to a bookstore on the concourse to see if there was something to read. Perusing the stacks along with me was an older gentleman in a hat. We backed into each other, and we both apologized profusely.

That voice… “You sound a lot like Leonard Nimoy,” I told him. “That’s probably because I am,” he replied, with a chuckle.

That launched a lovely 20 minute visit, where he told me about being in uniform himself (during Korea, where he met his first wife, Sandi), and thanked me for being in the service. I told him about how Spock influenced me, and how Star Trek was my ice breaker. I noticed him looking at my Space Operations badge. This badge was relatively new- having been launched about ’82 or so. It closely resembled a Starfleet insignia, especially the central delta shield over a globe. I had mine because my previous base had been involved with the Shuttle program, and I was on the space communications backline. We’d been shown prototypes by the designers, and got to pick the one we thought was the most appropriate. The Trekkies in the participating squadrons made it nearly unanimous. That design became the new insignia.

“Is that what I think it is?” he asked me, touching the badge. I told him about it, and my role in helping finalize its appearance. “Well, won’t you look at that…” He sounded a bit choked up. “I never thought I would see the day that this would become reality- but, here it is.” I saw tears in his eyes. We spoke a few minutes more, then I got a big hug from him, and we parted ways. I don’t think I stopped grinning until we touched down in Germany.

In retrospect, I was incredibly fortunate to meet him in that way. Had I been at a convention, I would have been to nervous to speak to him, and would have only had a moment or two to spend with him- if that. Instead, I got a nice visit, with laughter, tears, and even a war-story. And a hug. I loved him even more after that.

Over the years, and multiple movies, my love for Spock has waxed and waned, but never entirely disappeared. The Vulcan has a habit of turning up in the most unexpected places- from Heineken ads to graffiti. As the years have passed, he’s been refined, defined, and sometimes reduced to a mere shape- the silhouette of his head, the upheld hand in the Vulcan greeting… But he has prevailed.

I wondered what would become of the character, since he was left in relative limbo at the end of “Unification” in Star Trek: The Next Generation. So did Nimoy, who felt like the character had been abandoned. Then JJ Abrams and his reboot of Star Trek came along, and Abrams asked Nimoy for his blessing on both the film and the new incarnation of Spock.

The reboot re-ignited my love for Spock, and gave me a second Spock to admire, along with a fascinating young actor to follow. It deeply touched me that Leonard Nimoy and Zachary Quinto became close friends after Star Trek, and I am confident that my beloved Vulcan is in good hands with Zach. Quinto has shown the same love and protection for Spock as Nimoy has, and I hope he’ll don the ears in the future.

Spock has already laid his particular kind of grace and blessing on Zach’s career- he’s become a successful star, started his own production company, and is doing well. And my own relationship with Spock continues- he’s my oldest, and longest love. And I do love him- he’s been material in shaping who and what I am today. He was a familiar face when I was learning my way around new places, he was a steady mental influence, as well. I have adopted his Stoic mien, absorbed his discipline, and undertaken to become as spiritually grounded as he has.

Nimoy’s stories of the unexplained and paranormal helped to ignite and propel my own studies of such things, and Spock’s quiet mysticism has informed my own Path. He is as much a part of me as anything. Nimoy is gone, and although I had a feeling that his end was nearing, his death was still a shock. His passing has left a Spock-shaped hole in my heart, and a Vulcan salute-shaped mark on my soul. I will always be grateful to him for bringing this awesome character to life, and for making my own life more bearable.

Safe journey, space man…