Long, long before tumblr, before the Internet was the beast it is now, I was a teenaged girl in the mid-90s who loved Star Trek. I’ve enjoyed the movies, but I have to admit I haven’t seen much of the last few series. I left home when DS9 was maybe in it’s 2nd or 3rd season and Voyager hadn’t been out long, so I never saw them wrap up. Saturday nights when I was a teen thought was classic trek at 5, TNG at 6 and DS9 at 7. Luckily my parents indulged my monopolizing the only TV for 3 hours.
There was a used bookstore in town. Then called Railroad Books (I think) since sold but now a bookstore and cafe again.
I loved the place. Cavernous, floor to ceiling shelves overflowing with books, many of them older. Plus cheap prices and you could get store credit by trading in books. When a well-meaning relative gifted me a giant pile of Louis L’Amour books, my sci-fi loving self traded them in here to get books I wanted.
One summer I made a little money by picking up the owner’s for her lunch every day. I have to admit I used the money to buy star trek trading cards because I’ve never been the best example of good decisions. But I ended up with a complete set by the end of the summer.
And I found, among other things, these. I didn’t realize at the time, but it was my first brush with a greater fandom world than could be found in my small town. I learned that one could be critical of media and still love it, or use it as a lens to examine other issues. That zine is a collection from Spockanalia, though I didn’t know the significance at the time. The other two books are officially licensed.
By the time I got to tumblr, many moons later, Star Trek had long since faded into the background fabric of my life, part of the foundations, most certainly.
But perhaps that’s part of why I slid so easily into the Sherlock fandom; in some ways it felt like coming home.
Also used bookstores are awesome.