Doctor Who and Me (II) - Early to Middle Years

Pinnacle

On my eighth birthday I received my first Doctor Who Novelization. It was, by coincidence, "Revenge of the Cybermen." I remember next to nothing about reading it, but, then again, that was one of the most eventful periods of my young life, so I'm not surprised. I do know that it was published by Pinnacle (the link should lead you to the cover and a bit of info about the book.) Pinnacle published twelve Doctor Who books, both Third Doctor and Fourth Doctor stories. I had each and everyone at one point. Like most treasured items of youth, they are all gone now.

I remember looking at one of them and being most impressed with the cover. Two space ships side by side in front of a blazing sun. The one on the right was okay, but the one on the left looked really weird. All these sticks poking out of it. Bumps on the side, too. Never saw anything like it.

Also on the cover, was this monkey face. As the title of the book was "Doctor Who and the Day of the Daleks" I knew for a fact that that was a Dalek. Pretty cool alien, too.

I don't have to say how wrong I was, do I?

(With the exception of the Dalek links, all links in this portion of the essay lead to On Target, a site covering Doctor Who zations. Most interesting, for a long time fan, that is.)

Lead to Sin

Around the fourth, maybe fifth grade, I was to be an alter boy. I discussed this with my mother and we can't decide if it was her idea to do so or mine. Doesn't matter in the end; I was fine with the idea. Went to practice, even kind of looked forward to going to church for a change.

And then PBS started broadcasting "Doctor Who" in regular episode format on Saturday mornings. Same time as alter boy practice.

Well I wrestled with my conscience a bit...

That's a lie. There was no wrestling. I quit and watched "Doctor Who". It didn't stay on Saturday very long at all, but it was worth it. Oh so worth it.

Fan Fiction

In fifth grade, we were allowed to write stories and put them in a box to be read by the class. We might have read them in front of the class, but I'm sure I didn't do that.

I wrote one of the few pieces of fan fiction I would ever write. It was a Doctor Who story, of course, and it had a whole bunch of monsters and villains in it. Even ones who should have been dead.

For the life of me, I can not remember the plot or even the title of this opus. But it was stapled together and had a cover with all of the Doctor Who Monsters I could think of on it. It was probably a better read than most fan fiction.

Which is damning it with faint praise.

Birthday Present

Also during my fifth grade, Brother Todd was born. On the day it happened, Brother Eric and I stayed home from school and even got to sleep over at a friend's house. Big day indeed. After Todd was born, Dad took us out and bought us both a book a piece, a big deal in those days. Eric got a Garfield collection. I got "The Invasion of Time".

I often wonder if Eric remembers what book he got that day. Me, I don't think I'll ever forget.

Taping

Now here we get a little hazy in my memories. At some point during this period we bought our first VCR. Also during this period, I believe, the Chicago PBS started playing Doctor Who... from the beginning. The parents got the wonderful idea of taping each and every last one of them.

Finally my brother and I were able to see "Doctor Who" whenever we wanted to.

It was... glorious.