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I hate Dr. Who, but I have no intention of telling people not to like Dr. Who. If you like something I don’t, there’s no need for me to convince you otherwise even if I could (which I can’t). Instead, I’m just telling a funny story.

My father’s family was from Pike County in northeastern Pennsylvania. When I was a kid, we’d drive up there from the Washington, DC area for Thanksgiving. One of the many memories that stands out is being forced to watch Dr. Who. My Uncle Reid loved it, and to me it was a cheap Star Trek rip-off with even worse production values. Sure, Dr. Who came first, but I didn’t know that.

Let me explain a couple things about my Uncle Reid. First, he was once engaged and broke it off because his fiancé refused to have her wedding dress made out of a parachute. Why a parachute? No one knows. Uncle Reid wasn’t a pilot, and he never served in the military, so he wasn’t a paratrooper. Moreover, I imagine a wedding dress made from that material would be more expensive than a regular one. It made no sense. Still doesn’t.

Second, the High Point monument is a much smaller version of the Washington Monument in Washington, DC, but it sits atop Kittatinny Mountain. Before I was born, my Uncle Reid was a member of a group that would take turns ascending the tower to stand guard for an invasion from communists. That’s right. When the communists came to invade America, they’d almost certainly land in Matamoras, Pennsylvania, and this ragtag collection of idiots would be there to stop them.

This is the crazy guy that made us watch British science fiction. I just can’t get past that. Though like all people who’ve seen it, I do like the scene with Van Gogh.

You can’t pick your blood relatives; you just hope you don’t inherit the same characteristics.

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