Sci-Fi Fantasies and Midwestern Dreams
0I started watching Battlestar Galactica on Hulu this week. I’m not normally into Sci-Fi. This show has hooked me good, though. I think what I like most is that the characters are multi-dimensional. So often in TV and movies we end up with characters that are gross stero-types. People are more complicated than that. Life is more complicated than that. There are stories and backstories and history and choices and consequences. There are hopes and dreams and conflicted feelings and gray areas. It’s real life.
Of course, watching the show means I’ve started following some of the stars on Twitter. Yesterday Katee Sackhoff (who plays Starbuck) announced she would be attending Comic-Con this year.
**For those of you who don’t know, Comic-Con is next month in San Diego. This is another of those things that should definitely go on your I Should Do This At Least Once In My Life list. If you are into this kind of thing it is a Mecca experience. If you aren’t it is the ultimate in people watching. Music fans, soap opera fans, even paparazzi. They have nothing on Sci-Fi fans. These people are SERIOUS fans. I went to Comic-Con once, years ago, with a guy I was dating at the time. He was serious about it. I thought it was hilarious! We broke up shortly after that.
Katee’s announcement was all it took. My boundless curiosity about people took over. Down the rabbit hole I went.
How does a girl from Portland, Oregon end up playing a lieutenant in a sci-fi series reboot with a cult following?
I didn’t spend a whole lot of time looking into Katee’s history. I did check out her website and learned that she is one hard-working woman. She’s filming a movie and working on a pilot for a new TV show. She travels doing sci-fi conventions and lectures. She maintains a website for her fans where she blogs and vlogs. And she tweets. A lot.
As I read through her bio and poked around the web to learn a bit more about her I wondered if she ever gets tired of being identified solely as Starbuck. When she headed to Hollywood from Portland was that her dream? Sure, that’s the role that put her on the map and has opened other doors for her in her career. But, is that what she wants to be know for the rest of her life?
Similar questions came up as I dug into her family history.
How does a girl from Germany end up bearing eleven children fathered by a guy from Pittsburg, Kansas?
Hermina Alseleben married William Sackhoff in 1883. Seventeen years later, besides having a husband and ten children to care for, Hermina also had her father-in-law, a farm hand, and the local minister living in her home AND she was pregnant with child number eleven. Her six oldest children were all boys, working on the farm. Her oldest daughter was only eight years old but I bet little Annie helped around the house and with the younger children. (I hope!)
As I looked into their lives and the conditions in that farming community at the turn of the last century I wondered if Hermina ever got tired of being identified solely as the farmer’s wife with eleven children. Did she have other hopes and dreams for her life when she left Germany at the age of 13 or did her life turn out better than her dreams?
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