The upshot of all this is that I have lived my life to a significant degree, in Tony's long shadow. The psychological damage he did to me has crippled and restricted me in ways I am only now beginning to deal with. For many reasons, both positive and negative, I wish he had lived on. For one thing, I have had to contend with the fact that the World in general thought him a fine fellow, which fact has continued to alienate me from pretty well all social institutions in general and so-called 'authorities' in particular. Because of Tony's profound parental incompetence, I quickly became a deeply angry young man and, far from mellowing, have become a much angrier man as I have gotten older. For one thing, if I could push a button and blow Vatican city and every catholic edifice and institution Worldwide to kingdom come, (along with churches, mosques, temples and synagogues everywhere) I would do so joyfully and without the slightest hesitation. In like manner, though for less seriously considered reasons, I profoundly dislike and intensely resent the institution that bloody awful cheesy 'Doctor Who' has become. Its continued existence at all, let alone its modern resurgence, fills me with gall. I refuse to watch it and try, as far as is possible these days, not to even think about it. If I could push a button and do what all the silly 'daleks' and even sillier 'cybermen' and stupid bloody 'sontarans' and the like continue (I'm told) without success to attempt to do and, once and for all kill off the bloody annoying 'Doctor' so as to have him disappear entirely from TV screens and schedules everywhere, I would similarly do so cheerfully and without an instant's hesitation save that necessary to briefly savour the moment.
Despite my declared wish to exterminate (this part at least of) Tony's legacy, I have perhaps paradoxically become deeply set on understanding his life and work and why he acted as badly as he did. In doing so I certainly have no particular 'axe to grind' in advancing either his reputation or his 'cause'. In addition to being my afflictor, now forever beyond my vengeful reach, he remains however, MY father. His works are MY father's works. His history is MY father's history. It bugs me, almost beyond belief, therefore to have to read the arrant rubbish that, due to his early involvement in 'Doctor bloody Who' rather than in any of the other infinitely more worthy and dramatically satisfying projects he was involved in, has been and still is written about him in one 'unreferenced' so-called 'work' or another on this or that aspect of that awful childish pap. I contend here, therefore, that unlike any of the various writers and so-called researchers who from time to time, in this publication or that, have presumed to comment, mostly without a shred of verification from anyone who actually knew and lived with him, on my father's life and work, that I am far more painfully and intimately well acquainted than anyone else, (with the sole exception of my mother) with the subject-matter of my various edits.
