I’m a child of 80s pop culture. Those were my defining years. And I’m a story teller and filmmaker, so the films from that era shaped me.

And the iconic films of the 80s were mostly made by one man, John Hughes. He died suddenly today, and in the outpouring of news articles and facebook updates I find myself once again reflecting on how much I hate our response to those who have died.

Here’s a man who shaped a decade of comedy filmmaking. And he shaped a generation of filmgoers. Yet in recent years his work has been discounted as out of date, while gross-out work like Judd Apatow and Will Ferrell has been heralded as the way comedy should be done. Click to continue »

Forty years ago today a man first set foot on the surface of the moon. Neil Armstrong left a boot print and uttered his immortal “One small step for man, one giant leap for Mankind.” And here I am, suddenly struck by how much this anniversary celebration spotlights where America is and isn’t in 2009. Click to continue »

I’m suddenly awash in blog topics, but this felt like something I should write the minute I felt inspired. No, inspired is wrong. Challenged is a better word.

I attend a gathering of Christians in the entertainment industry – an odd group who are way too liberal for “Christians” as most people think of them, and way too grounded / conservative / stupid (depending upon the person judging) for the rest of Hollywood.

I generally get something out of it, but tonight the speaker touched on something profound. Or, more specifically, profoundly sad: Click to continue »

GM used to be the biggest company in the US, and one of the most successful in the world. Now they’ve filed for bankruptcy protection, becoming “Government Motors” with 60% owned by Uncle Sam. Hopefully they will emerge soon and stronger. And since much has already been written about this fall, both supportive and damning, I find myself a bit nostalgic about my first love affair with the American car. Click to continue »

My wife and I went and saw “UP” on opening day. In 3-D no less. And I won’t fill this entry with all the reasons why Pixar is in a class by themselves, or why they are able to avoid the story stupidity and low-brow mimicry of typical studios. Suffice to say… they know how to tell a good story.

When it was over I found myself not just thinking about “Up” or Pixar, but my personal connection to movies. More specifically… why films can make me cry. Click to continue »

I’ve been around churches long enough to hear people say being a parent teaches you how God sees us. But the more I think about that the more I think it’s wrong. I say… if you wanna know how God sees us, get a Dog.

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When I moved to Los Angeles I had my share of nay-sayers. Some folks in influential or mentor-type roles really questioned my thinking. I was 23 years old and “following a dream”. One in particular asked me “How long do you intend to do this?”

Wanting terms and conditions. A quantifiable plan. Milestones.

I responded “How long is a dream worth chasing?” That shut them up. They had no answer for that, and I don’t think they’d ever even thought of the question.

Now, thirteen years later I don’t have an answer for it either. How long is a dream worth chasing? I find that to be the lingering query of my existence. If forced to answer I would quickly say “as long as I have breath…”

But reality does dawn… even on us dreamers. Click to continue »

If you ever liked photography.  Get a Digital SLR.  The ability to take a picture, see if it worked, and fire again is invaluable.

I’ve decided to embrace the enormous world of FLICKR.  And now I’m finding myself even more schooled.

More pictures are loaded than before, and comments are easy.  Thanks for looking.

I have a pretty small family.  My father is an only child, and my mother had a younger brother.  Steve, my uncle, died three years ago.  And yesterday I was walking my dog behind a scruffy guy smoking a cigarette.  He looked like my uncle.  The smell from his cigarette was exactly the same.

So it got me thinking about him again, and the significance of his death.  Thus, I’m posting the tribute I wrote almost exactly 3 years ago:

The Funeral
12/25/05

My uncle Steve was a ball of contradictions, and awash in unused potential. He was loner, nearly a hermit, but maintained a childlike connection to his mother. When a subject interested him he trapped information like a boa constrictor, squeezing every bit of fascinating usefulness out of what he learned. So he must have known the realities of his vices, but he never banished them. In the end it was the worst of him that got the upper hand. He died alone, brought to an early end by his favorite vice, smoking.

Those of us left to mourn him were now faced with reconciling the best of him with the worst of him. No one could deny his humor, his mind, or his passion for quiet solitude in the outdoors. And I found myself besieged anew by our similarities, and aware that my mind, my humor, and my yearning for wilderness solitude fall more in line with him than even my own father.

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So the Olympics are here… the round the clock world class performances in sports you never think twice about for 3.75 years. And I’m hearing all the “every four years” stories around me, including an old friend of mine who’s been blogging about his Olympic obsession.

Like him, I find myself awash in thoughts and emotions which visit every time the Olympic theme plays and the rings fill my TV screen as part of some far too expensive graphics package.

For as long as I can remember I’ve looked at these athletes and thought “What’s next for them?”. Especially during the summer games when spritely girls who can’t drive or see over coffee tables become the subject of heartfelt mini-documentaries about their grueling schedule and struggle to be a teenager.

16 year old superstars. Or 20. Maybe 25 for the real late bloomers. They arrive at the peak of their life – an Olympic performance. And if they win a medal it gets worse. Now what?

The pinnacle of existence before they’ve even had the chance to find a wrinkle or a gray hair. That leaves a lot of decades still to come.

And I think of the other side. The “I coulda done that” part of every American sitting on the couch eating potato chips while Michael Phelps makes a swim race look like a soak in a hot-tub. Of course we couldn’t, but it’s worse than that… Click to continue »