The Doctor Is In

I can remember when mentioning Doctor Who in the presence of people my own age resulted in either a blank look or some comment about how their dad used to watch that show. But gone are the days of a show with hokey sets and visible zippers in costumes. Doctor Who is back with just enough camp and way better special effects. Now he's finding a new audience, and I am no longer the only person under 40 who loves the Doctor.

Wednesday night in my fiction class, I heard some people talking about "the Doctor." When I showed them the picture on my laptop's screen (a picture of David Tennant as the Doctor) one girl swooned, swooned. Keep in mind that these girls are all at least 10 years younger than I am. When I mentioned that there would soon be a new actor playing the doctor, we were soon bemoaning the loss of our beloved doctor...just like I did when Christopher Eccleston left...just like fans have done every time the Doctor has regenerated.

Last year, I was walking down the hallways at school and saw a girl with a t-shirt. It had a picture of the TARDIS on it. (The TARDIS is the Doctor's ship, an old-fashioned police box, and it stands for Time And Relative Dimensions In Space.) The t-shirt said, "You never forget your first doctor." Very true, I think. Mine was Tom Baker, a kooky doctor with a hat, impossibly long scarf, and a pocketful of jelly babies. I thought nobody could ever be a better doctor than him...until the next doctor came along anyway. So, today, as I am cleaning my house and doing laundry and all those very prosaic things that must be done, I am going to watch the Doctor, my Doctor. Maybe the new guy will by my Doctor, too.