Making Trek Connections

A funny thing happened yesterday. I was out running an errand at work. It was cold, and I had to go outside to another office, so I threw on my coat. In the pocket of my coat was my new iphone (which I love). In the other office, I got called into an impromptu meeting with two colleagues, one of whom I have never been in a meeting with before. In the middle of the meeting, my phone rang. The odds of this happening are incredibly small. I don't usually have my phone with me at work. When I do, the ringer is usually off. I get very few phone calls on my cell phone in general and almost never during the day. And of the phone calls I get, most of them are from my mother or Matthew, both of whom have their own ringtones on my phone. This call triggered my default ringer. After I silenced the phone and apologized to my coworkers, the one I don't know as well asked me what the ringtone was. I answered sheepishly that the ringtone was the Star Trek: Voyager theme song. My colleague's face lit up, and he said, "Of course! I knew it was Star Trek. Yes, the Voyager theme."

It was a brief moment in my day, and we didn't have time to keep talking about it, but it was such an unexpected discovery that it stuck with me. I'm sure the people I'm close to know that I like Star Trek, but there aren't many ways that the random colleague or classmate or acquaintance would know. And yet, somehow I make these connections, however unlikely they are. We all talked about forming friendships because of Star Trek in our "Why I Love Star Trek" essays, but I'm still not sure how it is that Trekkies find each other. I guess something that important in our lives just finds a way to come out.

How have you discovered other Star Trek fans?