034_intoinfinity.jpgScrambling about in the between-ways of my brain.  Which incidentally resemble the long underground halls of school buildings built in the fifties, with fallout shelters and hidden caches of supplies.  Mostly way-past-their-date cans of beans and crackers.

In the flickering candlelight I see two themes.  The rusting and crumbling structures of a prison-like architecture, or the dark and echoing tiled halls of an underground hideout structure that while faded and dirty, still seems habitable.

That little demon child is still out there. Small, but fast and vicious.  Just being here scares the stuffing out of me.  My instincts are humming at me to get away, get out.  Panic and fear!

Then I come across a piece of paper with a drawing on it of a long, cylindrical spaceship.  On the back, written in magic marker is the phrase “into infinity”.

Whoa, flashback time.  I remember this spaceship from a TV show way back.  But I can’t remember anything about the show itself except a few brief images, and the crew of the ship being drawn into a black hole at the end or something.

So my science officer does the old internets search-a-roo and I find out the full title of the TV movie is The Day After Tomorrow—Into Infinity.  I find out lots after that.  That the captain of the vessel is played by the same actor who played Alan from Space 1999, one of my favorite shows as a kid!  The DVD of the movie is only available to people who join the Gerry Anderson fan club.

Gerry Anderson did a lot of science fiction shows, some of which I watched with the folks when I was a kid.  Shows like UFO and Space 1999.  I had no idea he’d made this movie that I hardly remember now, but which my Bad Ronald obviously hasn’t forgotten.

In the movie, the crew of the ship reaches their appointed destination (YouTube is our friend!) and have to make a decision.  Return to earth with all the data they’ve gathered on Alpha Centauri or continue on into the unknown and risk danger.  They decide to press on, and as a result they get into hot water, while their adventure begins.  The movie was meant to be the pilot for a new science fiction series; it just didn’t reach that goal.

I certainly don’t want to find myself on the other side of a black hole never to return to earth, but I’m thinking there’s a similar choice here.  Go back to the visible hallways of the haunted house in my brain or travel onwards.

It means a lot to me that this small piece of my past is returned to me.  And unlike the protagonists in the movie, I believe I’m equipped with the means to find out what happens afterward.  I see friends of mine making brave steps forward, reaching out into the darkness for a connection with their own lives and the lives of others.

I’m traveling onwards.