Randyland

Starting from when I was 4 years old, I had Science Fiction dreams. Very vivid ones.

In one, I was always in the courtyard of my condo building. Either on the balcony overlooking the courtyard and pool, or on the first level. And there was an enemy. He didn’t have a name, but he was definitely a badguy.

We were always sitting across a table from each other, giving each other drinks that we both knew were poisoned, and refused to drink.

Hey. I was 4.

There was yet another dream that I remember vividly where I had a time machine. Imagine a cylinder, just the size of a person, fatter along the top than the bottom. Along the top, at the level of your eyes, are video screens and control buttons. And handlebars, just like on a child’s bicycle, but facing vertically, so you can grip them as you are looking at the video screen. At the bottom, the narrower end, is a rim that you can step on, while gripping the handlebars.

To use the time machine, you’d step on the rim, grip the handlebars, and use the controls. On the viewscreen, you could see where you are about to go to. Then the entire machine rise into the air and spin, faster and faster (and gripping the handlebars tightly was critical at this point!) A brillant light would flash, and then it would travel. I used it to travel back to prehistoric times, with dinosaurs romping around a green verdant jungle.

Naturally, I loved science fiction shows, too. My favorite was Dr. Who. The doctor at the time was Tom Baker, and the show aired at around 6:30 on channel 11. I never missed it. And it’s small wonder why, since back then, the show aired in parts of a half hour long each. And, unlike in later years, they showed the episodes and left it in cliffhangers.

But while in the middle of an episode, channel 11 decided to change the start time. I’ll never forget the announcement:

From now on, the show “Dr. Who” will be shown at 10:30 PM. You can watch the next part of this episode then.

I was 4. 10:30 was past my bedtime.

So I spent my life always wondering how that episode ended. Part of the problem is that I never remembered the name of the episode, and went through the Tom Baker episode descriptions fruitlessly trying to find it. Until today, when I found the Dr. Who episode “The Arc In Space” in the NetFlix Instant Queue. I’m watching it now.

So 34 years later, I finally get to see the ending.