I was five years old when X-Files came out. Every Friday night, my dad would sit down on the living room sofa to watch it. I’d sit on the floor, leaning my back against the sofa, and watch it beside him. For several years, it went like this. I saw the stuff of nightmares and wondered about what lurked in shadows and night skies. That sense of wonder was ever present.
Science fiction has been my genre ever since. I know not all of it was appropriate for a five year old, but if memory serves me right, I’ve seen more X-Files than Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles or maybe even Sesame Street in my lifetime. I wasn’t allowed to watch TV much as a kid, and time with dad was my only exception.
I read books. I read a lot of books. And I wanted to write my own, back then, too. My own sci-fi adventures. All going back to that time when I was five years old, and X-Files came out, and I got to watch that every week with my dad.