Following From a Distance

 

An abridged version of this piece was originally published for the Doctor Who Appreciation Society charity book, Pets in Time. I had been asked by editor Ian Wheeler if some of my animal-themed Doctor Who sketches could be used, and also if I might want to write about recently losing my dog, Ashi. 

If you've ever lost a beloved animal companion, then you understand how hard it was to do. This is the original, longer version of the story I wrote, which I then edited down to submit to Pets in Time, which benefits the RSPCA and can be purchased here.

                      ____________________________________________

The hardest thing to come home to is the missing presence. How do you sum up a dog who has been your friend for thirteen years and is now longer there? While I still have my two wonderful cats, who are happy to see my daily return from the World Outside, it was Ashi who accompanied me beyond the door for small adventures together.

Walking together in early evenings, we had our own separate interests: he had a world of scents to explore, while I observed a neon-colored Arizona sunset, or an elusive elf owl on a tree branch, or a retreating coyote. Then there was the nighttime walks and astronomy, looking for lunar eclipses and comets, or the International Space Station making a pass over the desert sky. Later, with him beside me and in failing health, I was able to see Saturn and Jupiter align in the southwestern sky and Mars glow bright in the east. I miss having his company for these expeditions, even though he was more interested in the messages left by other canines, which he would leave replies to.

I named him Ashi, which is short for Ashitaka, a character from the Hayao Miyazaki film, Princess Mononoke. He was a shiba inu, a fox-like dog of Japanese descent. Despite looking like a plush toy when he was a puppy, he had started out as quite a handful. Testing his boundaries, he had been spunky and stubborn, often a bratty little gremlin who would challenge me at every turn. Shiba are one of the more primitive of dog breeds, known for their independence, intelligence...and limited attention span. I soon realized that I had my work cut out for me to keep my fuzzy little goblin in line. Consistency and perseverance were necessary. 


And so was puppy obedience school, where Ashi became the class clown. He would usually end up surging forward at the command of “Stay!” He would grab all the treats that awaited the more obedient dogs in the class, who looked on as the little thief ate all their rewards. It took him a little longer than the rest of the class, but Ashi finally learned how to be patient.

Eventually, he performed his commands only with the assumption that something was in it for him. With calculated cuteness, he would present his paw to any human in anticipation of a treat. For thirteen years, I would hear: “He looks like a little fox!” Or sometimes it was “mini-wolf,” or a “baby coyote.” Always a wild creature—which is also how I thought of him during my first two years with him.

On our very first walks together, he complained loudly when I first put a collar or leash on him; then he would carry the leash himself, in his mouth. In later years, I was guilty of allowing him sometimes to run ahead, so he that he could scout his territory. He could run unhampered this way, but was still attached to a long lead, which I held on to very tightly.

Shiba are dogs that can rarely be off leash. Ashi was a notorious escape artist, slipping out of collars with ease and squeezing out of open doors. Running after him in these cases was usually a comedy of errors. Sometimes I had to use reverse psychology in these situations and walk away from him in the other direction. In most cases, he would stop running when he realized that I was not going to play his game of chase, or “keep away.” He would then follow behind me at a distance. Whenever he pulled one of these stunts, I was fortunately always able to retrieve him one way or another. I usually was terrified that he would keep running and never come back.

After two years of puppy craziness and a lot of gnawed books in my apartment, Ashi seemed to mellow almost overnight, and grew into the handsome gentleman he would remain. He always waited for me to go through a door first. He rarely barked except at his nemeses, hummingbirds and bumblebees, which he viewed as small demons who hovered and mocked him, just out of his reach. For his own small size, his bark made him sound bigger and much more ferocious. On one of our walks, he once scared off a creepy man on a bicycle by swerving back and forth in front of me, in “goblin-dog” mode and the man fled.

I had taken him several times to our local Japanese festival, where he got to have sushi and rice balls and meet fellow shiba inu. However, he would become terrified at the sound of the taiko drumming and would pull me towards the exits. “We’re done. Time to go home now.” Like many dogs, he hated loud noises, and the traditional Japanese drumming must have sounded to him like thunder and fireworks, which always left him shaking in fear. I usually had to sit with him in my lap every New Year’s Eve and Fourth of July.

His favorite treats were peanut butter and cheese. I gave him entire spoonfuls of peanut butter to lick , or I'd spread it on a favorite biscuit for him. Anytime he heard me opening a package of cheese, he was by my side, expectant.

From the moment I had first brought him home, I made certain to show him that the cats had a higher rank in his new pack by feeding them first, while he was made to wait. In this way, he would learn to respect them. For all the years I had him, he deferred to the tougher of my two cats, Mifune (named after Toshiro). With his selective hearing and un-canine love of catnip, Ashi was rather cat-like himself. His respect for the cats, however, did not prevent him from stealing their toys for himself. No fuzzy green felt mouse was safe from his jaws.

Later, all three of them would commandeer my bed for naps when I was not using it, and sometimes when I was.

When he still was able to, Ashi liked to sleep in the bed with me, usually at the foot of it, his head on my legs. When it was colder, he stretched out alongside of me, usually with both the cats as well. I remember being very sick one year, shivering, and waking up in a sweat when my fever broke to discover that Ashi was huddled up against me.

Being a shiba inu, he was still equal parts stubborn and elegant, needy and aloof. Sometimes he was stoic as a samurai, other times an absolute drama queen. To everyone else, he was a handsome charmer. At home, Ashi could be found under my desk or under my drawing table, usually at my feet as I worked. When he needed to go outside for a walk, he would sit at the door and make a low, deep noise that sounded like “Hmm.” To get my attention, he would also activate the Shiba Stare, which is a sophisticated and effective mind control technique.

When I was full of doubt or insecurity, I had only to stroke his fur or look at his grin to know it would be all right.

 
        Except, when it wasn't.

It was when he stumbled for the first time going up the stairs after a walk outside, that I realized something was wrong. What had started in such a subtle way with a lame back leg, progressed into a loss of muscle control in his hind quarters, an inability to even wag his tail. His tail had started to sag, no longer curling up over his back in typical shiba-fashion anymore, instead hanging loose and limp. In a short time, he succumbed to so much pain and immobility, that I had to carry him up and down the stairs of my apartment building so that he would be able to relieve himself. And even that became an excruciating effort for him because he could barely walk.

He had been losing weight, despite always having a good appetite. His back leg had begun to drag, sometimes causing his paw to scrape on the ground and bleed. I cleaned the injuries, bought him special paw protectors.

 Despite many veterinary trips and an ever-increasing amount of medicine, he was not getting any better as the end of the year progressed. After an examination, the veterinarian wondered if he there was the possibility of an undiscovered tumor somewhere; but we never did find out.

Eventually, he could no longer stand, and he had lost control over his bladder. Shiba are very fastidious and clean, and I think he was deeply humiliated by this.

After what was supposed to have been a routine veterinary exam one weekend, I had come back to retrieve him after a few hours, and realized things were not well. Right away I recognized the voice of the dog who was howling and shrieking nonstop in the back room. Everyone looked at me with concern and I was told he needed to be given even stronger pain medicine, as well as sedatives. When I brought him home, I tried to make him as comfortable as best that I could, but he began to yelp in pain again. I texted the veterinarian, who instructed me to increase his medicine. This did not help at all. I put my pillow and blanket on the floor beside his dog bed so I could sleep beside him and to be close. At one point, Mifune came over to him and rubbed her head against him and purred; this calmed him down for a short time and it was the only time he fell asleep that whole weekend. I thanked Mifune for that brief comfort for both of us. I too was able to get some brief sleep.

When he awoke in terrible pain again, crying, I knew that he was suffering and that I had to make an awful decision. It might have been the hardest thing I would ever do.

I texted my veterinarian. Perhaps it was that time.

I drove back to the vet before dawn broke. He was wrapped in one of my bathroom towels as I carried him inside.

I stayed with him until the end, and afterwards.

His collar and harness are still hanging from the doorknob of my apartment as I write. Before realization sets in, I still catch myself saying, “Be a good boy,” before I close the door to go off to work.

There is the empty place at my side now when I take solitary walks; I still imagine him running ahead of me. There is no more ball presented to me as a homecoming gift. There is the empty place under my desk, too, and under the drawing table. There is the end of the bed where he used to curl up or wrestle with a pillow.

I finally accepted that it was all right if I slipped up, if I still told him to “be good” as I left for the day. When he had run away from me in the past and I had walked in the opposite direction, he had always ended up following me home. I hope that he will continue to follow along from wherever he is now, however far away it may be. 

I won’t need to turn around to know that he still will be there, following from a distance.

__________________________________________________________

I finally made a little bonsai memorial for Ashi. It's not a real bonsai, and it's a toy shiba, but he looks quite happy, nevertheless. He was recently joined by his feline sister, GoGo, whom I dearly miss. 

You can purchase Pets in Time at the Doctor Who Appreciation Society store and read many other tales of beloved animal companions, both moving and funny, and also help support a good cause. 

Seasons of John Hurt

My earliest memory of John Hurt was actually of his voice, as the heroic rabbit Hazel in the animated version of one of my favorite books, Watership Down. Next came The Elephant Man, Jim Henson's The Storyteller and of course, Alien. However, my mother (who was born on the exact same day as Sir John— 22 January 1940) is very partial to his infamous scene in Spaceballs, which is her favorite Hurt performance.

Isn't little Captain Grumpy and 
his Gallifrey-destroying
superweapon cute? 

        

(This is a somewhat long post, so please bear with me.)    

    In 2014, I was still working on my sketchbook drawings of each incarnation of the Doctor in order. Each sketch (which would eventually become a finished illustration) had a little fob-watch in the corner to indicate each Doctor's "number." So what "time" on the clock should the War Doctor have? 

    This was a little bit of a quandary  because he was the hidden incarnation between the Eighth and Ninth Doctors. I decided his designation would be 8:30— half past eight.

    When I finished my sketch of War as he appeared in "Day of the Doctor," I celebrated by getting a little War Doctor action figure.    

    Around the same time, my friend Sandra Franklin had attended a talk that John Hurt gave in her hometown of Norwich, Norfolk, and she surprised me by showing him a copy of my sketch of the War Doctor.  She had asked if he could sign it for me!              

    He then asked her if she had another copy of it for him to keep—and luckily, she did! She told him that I was drawing all the Doctors in order, and so he wrote,

    "For Raine. All best wishes. Keep going!" 

    You can imagine how absolutely over the moon I was by this. Thanks must be given again to my dear friend Sandra. And to John Hurt (the legend!) himself for the encouragement.

    Needless to say, I kept going. 

Here's the very messy beginnings of the sketchbook drawing. You can see that I'm all over
the place in my book. On the opposite page, you can see my scribbled notes and
my trying to work out the position of his hands. 

Beginning rough stages: I made a large photocopy of the working sketch and traced it 
onto some vellum bristol paper. I also tidied up the fob-watch in the corner. 

        

And starting my first layers of acrylic gouache. There would just be a touch of subtle
color with the red of his sonic screwdriver and his brown eyes.

And the finished version!

Next up, I had wanted to do a Young War Doctor as he had appeared very briefly at the end of "Night of the Doctor".

    The image of young John Hurt that has been used in that short episode, which had finally shown the Eighth Doctor's regenerating, had been from a production of Crime and Punishment, which I had watched on YouTube.

    I had then made some reference drawings in my sketchbook as I watched the program. 

    I had decided that Young War needed to dramatically hold some sort of prop. At first. I toyed with the idea of his holding a gun (very un-Doctor-like, but probably more in line with the un-Doctorly War Doctor).

    Eventually, I had settled on his taking a trophy: an eyestalk from one of his archenemies, the Daleks.

    Little did I know synchronicity was at work because at the same time the iconic image of the young War Doctor holding a Dalek eyestalk was being used in the superb charity short film  Seasons of War. 

    (You can watch it here!)

    The eyestalk in this case had been used as a telescope, which I thought was an absolutely genius idea. It was the concept of director/writer Andy Robinson and writer Declan May.

The transferred sketch, with some tidying up of the fob-watch. War looks very grumpy,
like he wants to hit someone over the head with that Dalek eyestalk. 

Most of the painting done here; I decided I wanted to put some splatter on the
fob-watch in the corner to show that Young War gets down and
dirty with his business. 

The finished version, which the same small hints of color and
added splatter on the fob-watch. 

    I was contacted by some of the filmmakers about the happy coincidence of the Dalek eyestalk—and I ended making some new friends!

    Seasons of War became an excellent, limited run charity book full of brilliant stories and art, published by Chinbeard Books  and edited by Declan May for Cauldwell Children, all telling unknown tales of this previously secret incarnation of the Doctor. 

    I had ordered a copy right away. When I had received it and saw what a beautiful book it was, I had wished I had been able to contribute to it in some way. It had received many amazing reviews and there was even one in Doctor Who Magazine.

                       There would eventually be another printing of it...


    While the second edition (with added, all-new content: brand new stories, art and commentary) was being readied, something very sad occurred: we lost John Hurt, only a week after his 77th birthday.   

    This came as a great shock to me. I had been at my job at the bookstore when my co-worker gave me the news and I had to leave the sales floor to process it. 

    That evening, I was contacted by the publisher of Chinbeard Books, Barnaby Eaton-Jones, who had seen my two finished War Doctor illustrations. He told me that there would be a special new tribute to John Hurt included with this latest and perhaps last edition of Seasons of War—and he asked if my two illustrations could be included in it.

    I immediately said YES (of course!!) — and I was honored to finally be able to contribute in some way to this wonderful book. 

    When I received my copy of Seasons of War, I was nervous about seeing my illustrations in print. Would they fit in there with all the beautiful content I had seen in the previous edition?

Here are some photos (below) of my contributions. My two War Doctor illustrations sort of "bookend" a touching new tribute to John Hurt written by editor Declan May. 

 

    The book is absolutely gorgeously put together, and like the first version:  hefty! Which is great because there's so much more brilliant content in this next edition, a whole missing Doctor Who era starring John Hurt at different ages. So many fantastic stories, commentary and beautiful illustrations.

 

    Everyone involved did a wonderful job and all the love shows. And I want to thank the publishers once more for letting me be a part of it.

    All proceeds went to support Caudwell Children.

    Next, I was commissioned by Declan May to do a alternate cover for yet another (and last) reprint of the book.

    In 2017, North America had a solar eclipse. During this, I was working at a bookstore and trying to come up with an idea for the new illustration. 

    I had been drawing little doodles of War standing in front of an eclipse on post-it notes at work (don't laugh, that's how these things always start) and I finally settled on this idea and began scribbling in my sketchbook. 

    I had wanted some cosmic event in the sky as a good, dramatic backdrop for the War Doctor, and this is where the very timely eclipse came in. My thinking was that there might be symbolism in darkness temporarily covering a sun, showing his despair at having to make a terrible choice. 

   
    My sister Victoria told me that I didn't have any pictures of me actually at my easel or at my drawing table, and that people might want to see how I work. So here I am!

Also, on the easel, you'll notice the 12th Doctor's sonic screwdriver. No, it doesn't help me draw, but I used it to see the position of the War Doctor's hand while holding his own sonic.

(Oh, who am I kidding?  It's a seriously awesome sonic screwdriver and it's just fun to play with it because it lights up three different ways and makes cool noises.) 

    There's been a few photos of my hand holding my pencil or paintbrush, but it's hard to get a photo of yourself working when you live alone and your laptop's self-timer produces some dreadful photos. (Also, my dog and cats had no thumbs to operate a digital camera.)

    Luckily, Victoria happened to be visiting my (then) new apartment to help me put some drapes up over my many bookcases (it helps keep the dust off them and makes the room look less chaotic)—and she snapped a few pictures of me drawing.

    In the above picture, I'm making adjustments. It's easier to see your composition when it's vertical (on the easel) because you're able to step back and look at it from a distance. Before I had the easel, I used to just tape the work-in-progress to a wall in order to look at it.

The finished Seasons of War limited edition cover.

    What were your favorite John Hurt performances? Did you enjoy his fantastic Big Finish audios? (There's also a brand new series of Young War Doctor adventures as well, starring Jonathon Carley, which I'm eager to listen to.)  

    And once again, I would like to thank John Hurt for his inspiration.

                                                                    I kept going.

 

Charity Illustrations

Would you look at the size of that one, Doctor?

A few years ago, I had been asked by Christopher Samuel Stone if I would like to contribute some illustrations to a Doctor Who charity project that he was working on. He needed a few illustrations based on classic Who episodes, which also included the 1996 TV Movie. Here are the ones that I did. (Though sadly under-represented in my resulting batch here, are the Fifth and Sixth Doctor eras.)

All of these illustrations are vignettes in box frames. They're all done in my usual medium of acrylic gouache and ink, after which I scan them into Photoshop for clean-up and enhancement. They were a lot of fun to do, and they make me want to do more illustrations based on old episodes. (Hmmm. The wheels are turning...)

Planet of the Spiders

"Planet of the Spiders" was the last episode of Jon Pertwee's run on Doctor Who. The Third Doctor would eventually die of an overdose of radiation while on Metebelis 3 (the eponymous planet) and regenerate into Tom Baker's Fourth Doctor.

The challenge in this one was trying to make Jon Pertwee recognizable as seen from the back. I also wanted to make the Great One look more like a real spider, so I looked at a lot of spider reference. Fortunately, I'm not too arachnophobic.

...But then again, I don't live on Metebelis 3. Or Australia, for that matter. 

The Great One, a giant spider craving absolute power, wants the Metebelis crystal which the Doctor is holding. Needless to say, she does not succeed in getting it.

I usually tape the photocopied rough sketch next to the painting on the easel so I can consult it while I'm working.

I later added "sparkles" to the background of the picture, to represent more crystals in the spider's lair.

Also, I couldn't resist adding just a little bit of color for the blue Metebelis crystal.

The Second Doctor Running

The concept for this illustration was just to show "the Doctor running." It could be any incarnation, so I picked one of my favorites: Patrick Troughton.

"When I say run...RUN!"

This was inspired by Troughton's famous running scene in the serial “The Invasion,” in which he comically flees rampaging Cybermen.

I transfer my sketches onto vellum-surface bristol paper using a lightbox. I sometimes start by inking the drawing using waterproof  brush-pens; or even dark Prismacolor to trace over the pencil work. I then paint over that with acrylic gouache, working with inexpensive watercolor brushes. 

Trying to capture the scribbly energy of  my preliminary sketches can be difficult when I'm doing the finished illustration. It usually never works. I have to choose one outline as opposed to many. 

Because I couldn't find a good reference shot of the Second Doctor's shoes, I remember having to research Hush Puppies, the brand of shoes Troughton favored—specifically a pair from the mid-1960s! 

There's no color in this one at all. These days, I do like to keep color to a minimum, and usually just for highlights. Sometimes for atmospheric effects, I'll add some colored pencil or chalk to the mix. The paintings start very loose until I gradually sharpen up the line work.
                                                                      Leela

Here's Louise Jameson's fierce and cool Leela, the second of the Fourth Doctor's companions. As with the previous pictures in this batch, I chose to put the character slightly outside the frame. My idea was that the box-like frames look a bit like comic book panels. 

The jungle background here is meant to be reminiscent of the serial that introduced Leela, "The Face of Evil".

These episodes are especially notable for some brilliant dialogue by writer Chris Boucher which remains uncannily relevant even today:

"The very powerful and the very stupid have one thing in common - they don't change their views to fit the facts. They change the facts to fit their views, which can be uncomfortable if you happen to be one of the facts that needs changing."

Once again, here's the working sketch next to the painting's progress. I go back and forth from drawing table to easel, depending on how the picture is looking. Sometimes you need to look at your work in a vertical position, standing back from it to see what needs adjusting. 

The Zarbi

Here's the First Doctor and a very early adventure. I've actually done a couple of pictures of the Web Planet, (also known as Vortis) and its various insectoid creatures. The challenge here was to try to make the Zarbi look less like people in costumes, and more like actual insects—so it was back to looking at bug reference again.  

I remember that I was working on this on New Year's Day, 2017, and I'd felt a pain in my right side while sitting at the easel. Thinking it was appendicitis, I ended up going to the emergency room that night. It would prove to be nothing serious but that had been my anxious first day of the new year as I was painting the First Doctor.

"You Zarbi are a real pain in the side, you know? Hmm?" 

Victoria and the Ice Warrior

The brief for this illustration was just "Ice Warrior" but I wanted to feature the Second Doctor's companion Victoria Waterfield as well. At that time, I hadn't done any pictures of her yet.

"EeeeeeeaaaaAAAAAAAHHH!!!!"

Victoria is a displaced Victorian woman and here is being threatened by Varga, the Martian warrior. Either that or he thinks she looks cold and just wants to offer her a nice mug of  hot cocoa.

I've joked that I should use this illustration as a Christmas card. 

I think Victoria's superpower was her ear-splitting scream. If I was that Ice Warrior, I would have covered my ears and hightailed it back to the ship.
"No cocoa for you then!"

Ace and Karra

Most of the things that blew up in the Seventh Doctor's era were probably because of companion Ace McShane and her Nitro-9. Ace, played by Sophie Aldred, became an iconic companion for many people.

In the last episodes of the classic series, she encountered the deadly Cheetah People and most notably, the fierce Kara, played by Lisa Bowerman. Kara had tried to convince Ace to follow her wildest instincts and become a Cheetah as well. 

The background in this picture is the volcanic, dying Cheetah Planet.

Once again, I wanted to make Kara look a bit more like a real cheetah and tried to give her more menacing claws.


Later on, I couldn't resist coloring Ace's eyes in yellow to show the beginning of her own transformation into a Cheetah Person.







Eighth Doctor TV Movie     
(The Enemy Within)
 

The last two illustrations in this batch were both from the Paul McGann TV Movie, sometimes known as The Enemy Within. (Of course I saved the Eighth Doctor 'til last.)

In this first picture, the newly regenerated and very confused Doctor is trying to figure out "WHO... AM...I?" and he's looking for something to wear besides a morgue sheet.

.

I admit to being very fond of the 8th Doctor, as he was everyone's continuing lifeline to Doctor Who in the so-called "Wilderness Years" when Doctor Who was not on television. Instead, there were comics, novels and many, many Big Finish audios before Russell T. Davies officially rebooted the show

This is the scene right after his somewhat terrifying regeneration from Sylvester McCoy's Seventh Doctor (still to me the scariest regeneration, with Patrick Troughton's spinning around in a void, shouting "No, no, no, no, no, no!" coming in at second.)

He's kicked the door of the morgue down with regeneration energy (I presume.)

My "Fob-Watch" Eighth
Doctor illustration. 

For almost a decade afterward, the Eighth Doctor kept the banner flying for Doctor Who in other media. And he's also one of my favorite Doctors because of that, I think.

In my opinion, he had the coolest TARDIS—all Jules Verne-steampunk and Lord Byron-gothic, full of books, statues and candelabra—and an observation ceiling above giant iron arches which opened to the vastness of space. So when I did my first version of Eight for my Fob-Watch Doctor series, I needed to get this TARDIS interior in the picture as well.

And last but not least, here's a somewhat more goofy illustration of Eight and brief companion Grace Holloway on a stolen police motorcycle racing through San Francisco on New Year's Eve, 1999.

I'm of a certain age when I remember everyone thinking the year 1999 would be so futuristic because it was the turn of the millennium. Instead, it was rather... meh.

I remember watching the TV Movie the first time that it aired on network television in the States. Plot-wise, it was a bit bonkers, but I still have fond feelings for it. 

However, we all had to wait until 2013 to finally see the Eighth Doctor regenerate into his next incarnation...


                          
...Who would become the War Doctor, played by John Hurt...

                         
                                       ...Who will be the subject of my next post.                              

                        See you then!