It was one of those trees that if you got to the highest spot first, you staked that position as your own and no one could top it because there was simply no place higher – so of course all the kids scampered up the tree and raced for that position – I made it, though, but then I’d called the let’s-get-up-the-tree challenge while already halfway up the main trunk (well, some of those younger kids could climb like monkeys and you had to think quick to stay ahead of them – and I had a plan).

With much screaming and scrambling, the gang of 8 to 11 year-olds, about eight of us, made it into the leafy heights, me leading the way. As I had climbed higher up the tree than anybody else, I loudly proclaimed that I was Captain James T. Kirk of the USS Enterprise and, in true Star Trek fashion, we could boldly go where no tree had gone before.

I was delighted when no one argued with me for possession of the Captain Kirk role – and then I found out why. Forget Scottie or Bones or anyone else, the entire mob of them wanted to be Spock. I chuckled as they fought it out amongst themselves – I never wanted to be Spock, even though he was depicted as alien, super smart and with some great scenes where Bones would clash with him over his inability to see a joke. But something was definitely wrong with his lack of humor.

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