Writing Challenge Tuesday: Live Long and Prosper

Greetings all! These last few weeks have been quite busy, and with quite a few ups and downs. I still have a looming Super Secret Awesome thing, which I can’t yet post about publicly (sorry, I’m a tease.) On the sad news front, Leonard Nimoy passed this week, and I think the whole geek community is in mourning.

Death brings out the best and the worst in people. Seeing Zachary Quinto’s goodbye to a mentor and friend, Nimoy’s final post, the reactions from Shatner and the cast… It’s all been a heartache to every geek I know. I thought about skipping the writing prompt this week, and just drinking a toast to the dearly departed Spock. I decided to go ahead with it anyway. Best to honor someone with action, I suppose, even a very small one.

For this week’s writing challenge, I want to talk about wonder. I remember being a kid and watching Star Trek. I remember one of the first episodes I ever saw terrifying me. It was something about an alien life form that looked like a fried egg and latched on to Spock’s face. Years later, Alien would gross me out and make me fascinated with a far more vivid yet similar process. I have no idea what that says about me.

The main thing I remember about Star Trek, however, is how progressive and amazing it was. I saw metaphors for social issues played out through the guise of alien societies. I saw issues of race, sexuality, religion, creed. Star Trek took a huge chance in the greater fights for equality. Leonard Nimoy was a big part of that. He spoke up for literacy programs, for racial equality (particularly in acting), for gay rights, and for women’s rights. He was a genuinely good person.

I’ve been struggling to figure out how best to turn this into a writing prompt. I think the easiest way would be: Say goodbye to a treasured hero. How would you do it? How would you memorialize someone who affected so many lives? How would you bring closure to their story, send your protagonist off in style, make sure that they had the ending they deserved? More importantly, how would the characters around them honor their contribution and values?

See you all on Thursday for an Inspirations post. ‘Till then, live long and prosper.