At least the part of him that is cranky. And this little guy can be as cranky as they come. Especially when he just wakes up. Moody as the devil, and morose, and reflective it would seem. So he wakes up and is pissed as hell because Daddy isn’t around and he’s looking for me. And I’m reading SPIN because its 7:45pm and my body and mind are finally fully awake and alert and there is a cool breeze coming through the house and the two girls are doing their thing, ponies and dolls and fake nails.

So Luke finds me, just as I get to the part where Rivers is talking about his coastside home and the interview is talking about how Rivers forsook his material positions a few years back. So I switch over to father mode and call to Luke because he’s checking every room for me. And he stumbles into the front room where I am, climbs up on the couch, rests his head against my hip, and falls asleep again. So I continue to read with my son next to me falling in and out of consciousness and move on to another article about ?uestlove. I don’t get into The Roots.

Luke wakes up, for good, and he’s cranky, and he insists that the Privia that is pictured on the back of SPIN is, in fact, his. And he wants it NOW. And he’s cranky and I’m trying to read and so he and I get to this little argument about how the car isn’t his and how he can’t have it. Because now I’m cranky and I’m trying to teach logic by going completely against it until finally I say that fine, the car is his. He falls back asleep happy that he has his car and I move on to reading about “The Little Ones” and bend the corner to remind me that I need to download buy their latest album.

Then Luke wakes for good and the sun is setting and I look down to see the molasses-colored sunlight move across my boy’s face. And I’m in love with this kid. And I have to try to capture his mood and this light, and the moment. So I lovingly tell him how I feel about him and that I want to take his picture. And he’s pretty good at knowing what that means. It means nothing. It means to him that he doesn’t have to do anything, that everything is in it’s proper place and Daddy wants to capture it. So he looks out at the window and freezes. And his face is still and his body doesn’t move, and he holds the scene for me as I walk to my room to grab my Leica. And this kid doesn’t move. And it’s not pretention, or vanity, or a pose that he has found and wants to keep to capture a good side. It’s just an understanding that my 2 y/o has with me sometimes, that there are moments that we have to hold onto for as long as we can, and for me a photograph aids in that better than anything I know. And the picture will never capture what was felt, only I can retain that, store it away, and trigger the memory with a photograph that is taken a few short minutes after the feeling arrives.

And for me everything is aligned, and I have the feeling. So I grab my laptop and The Decemberists and end up here, to finish this. And today is an excellent day, despite what has happened and what will happened, today is an excellent day.

Cashier: You have a LOT of grey, dude. You don’t look old enough to have grey hair. How old are you?
Me: I’m 33.
Cashier: WHOA! Dude. You don’t look 33. But geez, that is a lot of grey hair.
Me: Thanks?
Cashier: So….are you like married and stuff?

So the rest of the conversation was ridiculous. This guy was not a kid. He was probably my age. I wouldn’t go so far as to say that he lacked tact, but it seemed a little weird to me all the same. Up until the grey showed up, I was usually pegged at about 5 years younger than I actually was. At 25 I looked 20, at 30 I looked 25. But since the grey, most people get it right. Occasionally I get the 28, 29. But only if the light is right. My Dad doesn’t look like he’s in his sixties, but then again, he dyes his hair.

I am very CONSCIOUS of my grey hair. It showed up about 2 years ago. I remember as recently as 2004 pulling out a grey hair ala’ Cruise in Vanilla Sky and giving the mirror the “oh no you didn’t” look. But the more it came, the fewer I pulled, and now I would say it’s here, and it’s not going away. But if I had to choose between no hair and grey hair, I’d choose my grey hair. It reminds me that I’m getting older, and that isn’t something I’m NOT looking forward to. On the contrary, I AM looking forward to it. My best years are ahead of me. Considering that past, they have to be.

But I have to say that about a month ago I bought some “Just For Men”. I really did. It’s still sitting there in the bathroom cupboard, and I doubt it will ever be opened. But it’s there. I was close to dying my hair until the day I bought that. Once it was here, and available, I became attached to my grey. I like it. It goes well with everything else, I think.

So I came to a realization that I am wasting a lot of time reading books that are of absolutely no use to me. For example, “Candy“, “The Hottest State”, “How To Be Good“, “God Head”. These are just a few books that were a complete waste of my time. So I’ve decided to not waste any more time and I’ve discovered a list that I’m going to work my way through. The list was compiled by Time magazine in 2005 and is found here:

http://www.time.com/time/2005/100books/the_complete_list.htm

As long as I’m reading, I’m going to make sure I’m reading the best. This also means that I’ll have to tackle insanely difficult books like “Ulysses”, “Don Quixote”, and “The Iliad”. But I suppose there is something redeeming about each one. People have said so.

Of the 242 books that I have listed as read, only about a dozen of them appear in Time’s top 100 list. Something is wrong with that. Not wrong with Time, wrong with me. But the more I thought about these “authoritative” lists, the more I looked at my list, and when I look at my list I see events. Just like smells bring about memories of people and places, for me books do the same in a large degree.

I began my list in 1996 and listed every book read from August of that year to November of 1999. Just over 3 years. That list consists of 82 books. That is roughly a new book read every two weeks. I wasn’t too terribly prolific, but for a 22, 23, 24, and 25 year old I think it’s a good number. These are pivotal years in anyone’s life. Fortunately for me during these times I spent most of my career managing different bookstores in California and Utah. I started at B&N in Oakland, CA, and finished at Borders in Murray, Utah. Between these two were 3 other stores. I had a large collection of books constantly surrounding me, good friends who were just as addicted to books as I was, and customers who exposed me to all types of literature. I didn’t need lists, I had a constant influx of book recommendations from people and peers. These were good times.

The first book recorded in ‘96 remains to this day one of my favorites, and set the standard for what I felt literature should do for me. It also changed how I think about things. The book was “Einstein’s Dreams” by Alan Lightman. The rest of that year was filled with books that kindled my pop-psychology mind such as “Prozac Nation” and “Girl, Interrupted”. It would appear that misery loved company the latter half of ‘96.

In ‘97 I read 21 books, the first two by Douglas Coupland. These books bring to mind my friend Melanie Hunt, as these two were recommendations from her. “Shampoo Planet” and “Generation X”. These were just two stories, nothing more. Nothing profound, or attempt to hijack personal beliefs. Just stories. But they bring to mind Melanie. And chocolate pudding.

This was the year that I discovered what GOOD writing was and tackled the writing of Kerouac, Salinger, Camus (thanks to Topher Clark), Kundera, and Vonnegut. This was also the year that I recall reading my first memoir, a book about Franz Kafka and how he influenced a group of writers living in Greenwich Village in the ‘50’s. I also read the book “The Underachiever’s Diary”, which set the stage for my love of discovering author’s debut novels. Many first-time writers came after that including Robert Lennon and Kevin Canty.

The clearest memory from that year was reading “On The Road” and “Catcher In The Rye” for the first time, and doing so during a road trip from Provo, Utah to Tijuana, Mexico. There were 5 of us packed in a little eco-friendly car and I read and read. I remember very little about the actual trip. My most vivid memory was sitting poolside in Temecula, CA reading the 4th chapter of Catcher. My second vivid memory was arriving in LA late one night, parking at the beach, and running alongside Dave Eaton straight into the ocean, jeans, shoes, and all. That was probably around the time Holden was contemplating his ducks.

‘98 was an even better year for me and literature and by then I was a full-on bibliophile. I tackled the complete works of Salinger, with special emphasis on “Nine Stories” and every cliff-note type of reading guide I could find. I also absorbed Steinbeck, Hemingway, Fitzgerald, Ford, Auster, Kafka, Chandler, Plath, and Irving Stone. I was married that year, in May, and remember very clearly later, in July, sitting at my front door with my feet up on the counter, reading “The Great Gatsby”. I recall the leaves falling through the door and onto my book, a dry breeze flowing across our basement apartment, and forgetting about just about everything. Earlier, in February, I read through “The Sun Also Rises”. My first Hemingway. I read most of that book at Cafe Del Sol, a Peruvian dive within walking distance of the bookstore. I would read, and eat my carne asada burrito and wash it down with my sangria. There are still salsa stains throughout the book, and the taste of sangria still brings to mind bullfights.

Also, two Steinbeck novels that year. First, “Travels With Charley” (via Morag McCloud), and second, “The Winter of Our Discontent”. Several Steinbeck’s would follow including a few memoirs. In ‘98 I made it through 31 books.

In ‘99 I slowed down a little bit. This was the year I moved to Las Vegas and had my own lust for life taken from me. I made it through 20 books that year, but the list shows few that were memorable. A couple more from Steinbeck, including “East of Eden” and “Cannery Row”, but the majority of books appear to be your garden-variety supermarket specials such as Cornwell, Kellerman, and Grisham. Not a good time. I believe to this day that your brain literally stops growing, and possibly completely atrophies, while in the Las Vegas city limits. The only redeeming experience while there were a couple photo shoots. The first at an abandoned mine, and the 2nd a series of polaroids that I did for 28mm magazine.

My original list stops in November of ‘99. I have another list that I started in ‘06 but it only comprises about a dozen books. Last year there were few as well. But In ‘08 I’ve read only one book, and it is already May. Right now I’m reading eight books. I believe there is a problem with that.

In late ‘02 I was reading 3 books, all biographies; Georgia O’Keefe, Ansel Adams, and Diane Arbus. The Arbus sticks out more than the others. She was a photographer, if you didn’t already know, and the writer had a way of bringing you into the story. It was relaxing, stimulating, and also tragic. But it was the first time that a book, and what it made me think about, manifested itself through other mediums. That was the year I stopped taking landscape photographs and began my slow path into portrait photography. Now, six years later, portrait photography comprises about 85% of my photographs. Maybe it was Arbus, or maybe it was that from ‘03 to ‘05 I went from married to divorced to married with 3 kids. There is a lot of portrait opportunities in a family of five, and not much time outside of the house. And, of course, my family is adorable.

I’ve started a new list. And I’ve compiled a reading to-do list. And it’s time to evolve, once again. It’s time to rearrange those cranial circuits and teach myself the ease and peacefulness of reading.

So I’m going to tackle the lists. I’ll probably handle the shorter books first like “A Separate Peace” and “Siddhartha”. You know, just to get into the groove, snag the low-hanging fruit. Geez I hate that phrase.

That is all.

Then I stop, and lay down, and look up at the sky.  And it’s mostly sunny, but there are tiny flakes of snow still visible against the green of the pine overhead.  Some land directly in my eye.  To the east, where the mountains are, the snow is falling much harder than it is here.  And there is a chill, but it’s not chilly.  A breeze, but not windy.  And I’m by myself, but not alone.  And tonight’s thoughts cover me like a warm blanket.

And even though my mind drifts about, I know my time is almost up.  All the difficulties of the day have evaporated from the forefront of my thoughts, and that’s all it takes, it’s really quite simple.  Most of the time it’s much more elusive.  But it’s really all I need.  And the one thing I seem to rarely get.  So I’ll take it in small doses, especially when life presents a situation where I can control my time by preventing others from doing so.  And despite the monotony and the drudgery of a less than normal day, I know I’ll fall asleep feeling a little better, and all it takes is seven and a half minutes.  Some days it takes more, but not today.

So we have this room, and we have Jack Whitman (Schwartzman), we have an ipod playing music about Marlena Dietrich (song by Peter Sarstedt), there are odds and ends and all that.  So Portman (billed simply as “Jack’s Girlfriend”) is walking around, checking out his place and picking up his trinkets and whatnot.  Which, really, would be weird.  If I was living in a hotel and some girlfriend came in and started picking up my belongings, examining them, and placing them back down in a different place?  Well I would probably change the music, not give her any chocolate, and certainly not put my weiner inside her.  But I’m getting ahead of myself.   All these things to set up this scenario that builds to the scene where they are out on the balcony, it appears to be a wonderful view, but we learn it’s not.  It’s just a view of the hotel across the way.  Not really my point.

This stuff doesn’t matter to me.  What matters to me is that this guy is LIVING AT A HOTEL.  And I’m thinking about how great that would be.  Seriously.  I’m at one now, and I could stay here forever.  I’m in wool slacks, a button-up white collared shirt, and my dress shoes.  But I’m sitting in a lawn chair in 80 degree weather.  It’s perfect.  Except the sinus infection.

In about 7 minutes I’ll be getting back to my novel and I won’t have anything to do for about 3 hours.  Simply amazing.  Hotel living.  My wife will return from rescuing drowning airline passengers, and we’ll go out for crab or something.  We’ll watch Juno, most likely, and fall asleep together for the last time for the next few weeks.  But still, the hotel thing.  If I ever have the means, and I’m sure I will, I’m totally going to do it.  Living at a hotel.  I’ll even know the maid’s names by heart.  And it will be by the beach.  And I’ll get to know the manager so well that I’ll have a special place to keep my surfboards.  Most likely outside in some shed where he makes his own root beer or something.

Royal Tenenbaum did it, Jack Whitman did it, and the boys from Bottle Rocket did it for a spell.  What is it with Wes Anderson and people living in hotels?  Whatever it is, I’m buying into it.  Hotelology or whatever.  I don’t care.  We can have spaceships and spirits and electric soul catchers or whatever, I don’t care.  I want in the hotel club.  Another small point:  Wes Anderson was born in 1969.  I was born in 1974.  This means I have at least 5 years to be his creative equal.  Damnit, I just realized he did Royal Tenenbaums at 32 so I’m pretty much always going to be underachieving.  I’m glad he’s not my older brother.  THEN I’d have issues.

And I’m trying to figure out how much it would cost to do it.  I’m figuring this place is $100 a night, 365 nights +/-, so that would be $36,500 to live at the Sheraton Gateway in Atlanta Georgia.  I’m sure they’d give me a bulk rate so I’m gonna stick to $35,000.

But then if I had $35,000 to blow for living…ok so some guy just came by and asked my how I liked my Apple.  People really shouldn’t do that to me unless they have 15 minutes and 3 large burning a hole in their pocket.  MBPro’s rock, go buy one, you can stop buying self help books and start writing them.

So I’m thinking about $35,000 and what that could do for me…say….somewhere in Mexico.  I’m sure I could have no problem living fairly large in the Brian sense on $100/day for a year.  Just think of the blogging I could get done.

Well I gotta go call my Mom and see if they are running out of diapers.

Oh, and I also took a picture of the pool.  I took it seconds ago, tweaked the highlights, shadows, curves, then turned it into an exposure from Kodak’s 3200 ISO B&W film.  I like it.  I’d post the original, but then it would reveal just how lame the original is, lamer than you may think the final version is.  And that just won’t fly.  I’m sure there is something to the 5′15″ sign.  I’ll figure it out someday.

This post was written with the music of Satyajit Ray, who sounds a lot like Anandji Kalyanji from Thicker Than Water.  Check it out.

Click This Link To Watch Hotel Chevalier For Free 

On that note, I’ve missed reading, I really have.  And it’s not so much about my lifestyle with work and kids and being a husband or even time.  My mind won’t slow down long enough for me to digest words on a page, or words on a website, or words in a magazine.  I can sense a shift back to simplicity, and back to the joys of reading.  But there is so much out there to distract me.

That’s the trouble with all this media these days.  I just don’t know what to turn to.   For instance, right now I’m on a plane and I have a book, 2 magazines, my laptop, and my iPhone.  So in the space of just over 2 hours I’ve:

• Watched 3 video shorts on my laptop
• Watched 1/3 of “The Savages” (Philip Seymour)
• Composed 3 mini-blog entries, including this one
• Organized my iTunes playlists and pruned unwanted songs (only 43GB now)
• Organized my iPhoto slideshows (including my 178 photo slideshow I made for Senja last year)
• Created a new desktop wallpaper mashup in Photoshop
• Read 24 pages of my Ian McEwan novel (Saturday)
• Read the entire May edition of MacWorld.
• Started reading the May edition of Mac|Life

And this is just media that is distracting me.  I’ve also been thinking about:

• What I’m going to do and/or say when I land?
• When I’ll be coming home?
• Did Luke and Juli get their eyedrops?
• Are the Braves playing tomorrow?
• Exactly how long will this battery last?
• Legal expenses
• The shark attack today in SoCal and how many times I’ve been in those waters.  17 ft shark?!?
• Why CNN seems to always bash on Obama
• Why I only drink ginger ale when I fly

So yea, my mind is busy.  It’s ALWAYS busy.  At any given time I could make a list at least a dozen items long of things I’m thinking about…concurrently.  I’m sure you could to.  My point is though that…well I don’t really have a point except I guess I’m beginning to realize that I need to downsize.  And I’ve known this for quite some time.  Things just need to be let go.  The things that hold my attention; are they worth it?  The things that are worth it, stay.  The things that aren’t, well they go, or have to wait for a better time.  So how do I go about doing that?  There are a few things to eliminate that are easy enough.

• TV
• Direction-less internet surfing

Well that is all I can think of right now, but that should free up some time.  Not so much TV because I don’t really watch it.  But aimless internet surfing?  I’m guessing about 10 hours a week.  So what is the solution?  An internet surfing plan?  I guess so, I mean why do I people use the internet, why do I use the internet?  How could I use it better?  How could I get more from the internet while using it less?  Yes, see, THAT is the question that needs to be answered.

So back to my book.  Literature needs to stay.  But it has to be there in the first place, and I’ve lost my way as I entered parenthood.  But it’s back, it’s part of the plan, and the only reason why I’m writing this is because of a certain paragraph in the book that set off a fire in my brain.  Now the fire is out, and the charred remains are here for you all to see.

Senja and I blogged today at the same time, a rarity.  She blogged about fires and silicone, and I did this.   There is a joy that comes in blogging together, at least for me.  Letting that creative side out, side by side.

Capitola, 41st Ave. Small wave but I get launched after a late takeoff during a closed out set. I’m thinking I caught a rail. Footage by Senja.