At last Kirk (of course) notices the pattern. He begins to suspect something is not as it appears to the natural eye. Spock does his tricorder readings, and they discover an unseen alien presence on board. This alien presence feeds on their negative emotions and grows stronger and stronger. Even though they realize the truth, they must now convince the cynical Klingons of the force at work against them. I won’t go into the entire plot but this is accomplished within the necessary one hour time period. The Enterprise crew and the Klingons join together in laughter and back slapping camaraderie, causing the unseen entity (until this crucial point in the story) to diminish in size and finally disappear, leaving their presence forever.

Where am I going with all of this? My brother and I have fought for years. I didn’t like him and he didn’t like me. Somewhere in the back of my mind, I remembered this nice little guy from my childhood days, but that memory seldom surfaced. The gulf between us widened and deepened. Then one day, after my dad died, I decided I was through fighting with him. I realized that just as in this Star Trek episode, there was an unseen entity at work in our relationship. As we fought, hated, disagreed, it grew stronger. So one day I stopped, I just stopped hating him, being mad at him, judging him. I made a quality decision that no matter what he did, I would not take offense or be angry with him.

I noticed a strange thing. Once that decision was made, we started getting along better. It’s taken some time, but our relationship is being rebuilt. He is responding to me now in the same manner I respond to him, positively. I no longer look at him through the eyes of the past, but toward the future and what I want our relationship to be.

There is an unseen entity at work in all our lives causing strife and division, causing us to hate those we should be closest to and those we hardly know, and I refuse to let him have his way.

Remember who the real enemy is.

On the episode, “Operation: Annihilate!” little pancake looking creatures are jumping on people and take over their nervous systems. The pain they inflict drives people to insanity. They use the pain to control people. The pancake creatures resemble one cell creatures similar to a brain cell and are part of a much larger organism. One of them jumps on Spock’s back and he also experiences excruciating pain. McCoy (the medical doctor) finds that Spock’s nerves are surrounded by some strange tissue and places him in a drug induced coma because the pain is so great. However, Spock fights through the pain and the medication and of course goes on to save the Enterprise and the people on the planet.

So what does all this have to do with me? I like to think of myself as a logical person, not succumbing to emotion but after my father died, one of those little pancake creatures jumped on me. It wasn’t so much the pain of his death as the pain of the memories of the past that surfaced. Things I’d long tucked away and chosen not to think about came rushing back, and I could not control the pain. It controlled my mind, my thoughts, and my peace. There was none, I thought I would lose my mind. That pain was my constant companion. It talked to me day and night. There was no escape. The thoughts just wouldn’t stop and the voices wouldn’t shut up. That little creature was part of a much larger organism that was set on destroying me and for about six months, it looked like they would have their way. My thoughts constantly battled with each other. I would try to think on the good things, but the little creatures kept sending the painful thoughts back. I found if I listened to Christian music and sang along, the pain subsided. I sang all the way to Waco. My husband said I went wacky in Waco. Actually, it was on the way to Waco.

Finally, my wonderful husband was able to take me on a vacation. I was a whipped puppy. We drove for a long time, several days. For the first few days, all I could do was sit with the passenger seat reclined, headphones on, listening to CD after CD of faith filled preaching tapes. Something on the inside of me started stirring, shaking itself off. It started rising, I could feel myself getting stronger and stronger. After a few days of doing nothing but listening to encouragement, I began to feel whole again. And the creature lost its control of me. I, like Spock, was able to fight through the pain and regain my sanity. My weapon of choice? The Word of God!

And I realized that my relationship with my father is what it was. There is no changing it. And no matter what happened in the past, what matters now is that he died a Christian and we get another chance to work it out, in heaven. And we’ll have all the time in the world to get it right.