I was in my mid 30s when I watched my first episode of Doctor Who. Growing up in America during the 1970s and 1980s, I had vaguely heard of Doctor Who, but knew nothing specific about this popular British science fiction television show. In fact, my only knowledge of the show came from comic books - not the Doctor Who comic books, mind you, but other books that had ads which mentioned them!

It wasn't until we subscribed to Netflix back in 2007, and I saw Doctor Who listed as one of the few streaming shows on that platform at the time, that I finally decided to give it a try. This meant that I was viewing the new, relaunched Doctor Who starting with the ninth Doctor played by Christopher Eccleston. To be honest, I wasn't too impressed - I felt that it was cheesy and the characters' actions often didn't make any sense. But I kept watching it along with my wife and young kids. My second son, in particular, really enjoyed the series! One positive benefit of watching it was that my son and I often talked about how fun it would be to visit London - something we eventually did in 2022! Anyway, once David Tennant took over as the Doctor I started to enjoy the episodes much more. We watched the series on-and-off for a few years, and finally stopped after a season of Peter Capaldi as the main actor. By that time I felt a little bit worn out by the many episodes where the Doctor had to race against time and dastardly enemies to save not only Earth, but all Earths in all multi-verses throughout all of time! I did, however, enjoy the episodes that were more down to Earth and not part of some giant, over-arching plan to destroy all of humankind.

Well, a couple of months ago my wife and I decided to re-watch the series starting with the Christopher Eccleston episodes. I must say it has been really fun watching them this time, and I am enjoying the series immensely! Even though we are only on the fifth season (or series, as they would say in the U.K.) I am finding that adjusting my expectations has helped quite a bit. This time through I was expecting a lot of silliness and over-blown drama, so I wasn't disappointed when the Doctor did all kinds of crazy stuff. That seems to be a lesson I keep learning in life - that having certain expectations (or even any expectations at all) can often contribute to my unhappiness with something. If I just learn to let go of those expectations and enjoy the thing on its own merits (or not) then I am much happier. I am now looking forward to the new Doctors that I haven't encountered yet... and maybe even some of the old ones that I missed. I'll let you know how that goes.