William Shatner shares some poetic, and dark, words about his trip to space

[Flannel Jesus]

https://variety.com/2022/tv/news/willia ... 235395113/

I looked down and I could see the hole that our spaceship had punched in the thin, blue-tinged layer of oxygen around Earth. It was as if there was a wake trailing behind where we had just been, and just as soon as I’d noticed it, it disappeared.

I continued my self-guided tour and turned my head to face the other direction, to stare into space. I love the mystery of the universe. I love all the questions that have come to us over thousands of years of exploration and hypotheses. Stars exploding years ago, their light traveling to us years later; black holes absorbing energy; satellites showing us entire galaxies in areas thought to be devoid of matter entirely… all of that has thrilled me for years… but when I looked in the opposite direction, into space, there was no mystery, no majestic awe to behold . . . all I saw was death.

I saw a cold, dark, black emptiness. It was unlike any blackness you can see or feel on Earth. It was deep, enveloping, all-encompassing. I turned back toward the light of home. I could see the curvature of Earth, the beige of the desert, the white of the clouds and the blue of the sky. It was life. Nurturing, sustaining, life. Mother Earth. Gaia. And I was leaving her.

Everything I had thought was wrong. Everything I had expected to see was wrong.

I had thought that going into space would be the ultimate catharsis of that connection I had been looking for between all living things—that being up there would be the next beautiful step to understanding the harmony of the universe. In the film “Contact,” when Jodie Foster’s character goes to space and looks out into the heavens, she lets out an astonished whisper, “They should’ve sent a poet.” I had a different experience, because I discovered that the beauty isn’t out there, it’s down here, with all of us. Leaving that behind made my connection to our tiny planet even more profound.

It was among the strongest feelings of grief I have ever encountered. The contrast between the vicious coldness of space and the warm nurturing of Earth below filled me with overwhelming sadness. Every day, we are confronted with the knowledge of further destruction of Earth at our hands: the extinction of animal species, of flora and fauna . . . things that took five billion years to evolve, and suddenly we will never see them again because of the interference of mankind. It filled me with dread. My trip to space was supposed to be a celebration; instead, it felt like a funeral.

[vegetariantaxidermy]

Who's William Shatter?

[Flannel Jesus]

Ps yes I'm aware I spelled his name wrong. Thanks Android auto correct.

PPS. Oh, it let me change the thread title apparently. Cool.

[Iwannaplato]

Well, good for him. I enjoyed his character, but from what I can tell, he seems to have been a bit of a dick as a person. But, yeah. I feel very little interest in space travel. And just watching actual astronauts and what seem to be fairly realistic versions of space travel in films (which make it look nearly always as if you are in prison), I haven't needed to actually get shot off the earth in a rocket to suspect this.

[vegetariantaxidermy]

Apparently it's really unpleasant and can do your head in (unless you are a particular kind of person) because it gives you claustrophobia and agoraphobia at the same time. Not something I crave to do.

[Age]

Was it NOT ALREADY BLATANTLY OBVIOUS that out of the WHOLE Universe there is only One place, ALONE, which is Truly inviting, welcoming, and even life-giving?

YET here you ALL ARE absolutely ruining and destroying the One and ONLY REAL place that can support you, and which you call HOME.

[Walker]

...

Sounds like he was viewing concepts in his imagination against a grandly-scaled backdrop.

[Walker]

Who's William Shatter?

Captain Kirk meets reality.

[vegetariantaxidermy]

Really, it barely qualified as 'space' to be honest.

[Walker]

Really, it barely qualified as 'space' to be honest.

The big visual was probably the curvature of the earth, and apparently he got to float around a bit. Could have made him a bit queazy, or maybe a lot queazy with that big gut. Good Grief Captain. Still got the hair though. Amazing.

Could have been an elaborate simulation. Low probability, perhaps, but doable with expensive tickets to ride. The weightlessness would have been a problem, but these days maybe not.

[wtf]

Still got the hair though.

He never had the hair. He's always been bald or balding. He wears toupees. Sorry to disillusion anyone with this tragic news.

https://www.bonohair.com/does-the-star- ... -a-toupee/

https://www.cracked.com/article_30689_w ... k-set.html

Then again, some claim he has a full head of hair. William Shatner's hair has been a mystery for decades.

Fellow actor George Takei claims that Shatner wore a toupee from the very beginning of the 1960s Star Trek television series.

However, makeup artists on that show have claimed that Shatner did, indeed, have a full head of hair (and the makeup department would be in a position to know, since they shampooed, conditioned, dried and styled his hair on a regular schedule).

https://www.quora.com/Did-William-Shatn ... -Star-Trek

There's even an entire website devoted to the subject, called Shatner's Toupee.

https://shatnerstoupee.blogspot.com/

Quite the mystery. Where no hair has grown before.

[vegetariantaxidermy]

Still got the hair though.

He never had the hair. He's always been bald or balding. He wears toupees. Sorry to disillusion anyone with this tragic news.

https://www.bonohair.com/does-the-star- ... -a-toupee/

https://www.cracked.com/article_30689_w ... k-set.html

Then again, some claim he has a full head of hair. William Shatner's hair has been a mystery for decades.

Fellow actor George Takei claims that Shatner wore a toupee from the very beginning of the 1960s Star Trek television series.

However, makeup artists on that show have claimed that Shatner did, indeed, have a full head of hair (and the makeup department would be in a position to know, since they shampooed, conditioned, dried and styled his hair on a regular schedule).

https://www.quora.com/Did-William-Shatn ... -Star-Trek

There's even an entire website devoted to the subject, called Shatner's Toupee.

https://shatnerstoupee.blogspot.com/

Quite the mystery. Where no hair has grown before.

He is over ninety. If he wears a toupee then it's a really good one.
He was still fabulously sexy as a young man.

[Walker]

He never had the hair. He's always been bald or balding. He wears toupees. Sorry to disillusion anyone with this tragic news.

You're a quick one. Over ninety and he's got a full head of hair.
Amazing.
It probably started out on a Korean girl's head.

He's still got the hair.

*

Here’s another well-known hair gusher who’s over ninety, and he’s even Italian. Amazing. Still got the hair. How do they do it, do you suppose?