Driving home from California this past December, I stopped in Roseville, or Rosedale or some other “Rose” town in Southern Oregon, to meet Colin and Livi for breakfast. It was a gloomy day and within the next several hours I would encounter some of the fiercest driving conditions I’d ever seen, torrential rain of biblical proportions.

We stopped at one of those “family restaurant” type places that are everywhere out there on the interstates. As I got out of the truck, a fleck of colour on the pavement caught my eye.

Remember back in school, picture day? Remember how you would choose the package of pictures you wanted and when they came, you would cut out the wallet sized ones and write something on the back and share them with your friends. It became a big deal if you got that certain girl’s picture and if she wrote something flirty on it you would read it several times over the next week to try to distill new meaning from it. Maybe that was just me.

So I glance down to see one of those pictures, a girl, ground into the dirt and the wet of the parking lot. I didn’t think too much of it, but while we were eating it sat there in my mind and I mentioned it to Colin and Livi. I decided I would have to take a picture of the picture, so after breakfast, there I am in the rain, down in the wet dirt trying to take this picture. I wonder what the story is behind that picture. I wonder how she ended up discarded in the parking lot of some generic freeway diner.

As I was pulling away, shaking the rain out of my hair, Colin phoned my cell. “Hey man, did you take a picture of that picture?” Yup. I did.

Tags: Photography, Travel

There is only one day per year when I can say “that’s it” and be done with a whole Volume of Magazines. There is only one day when I can turn my attention away from the job of making pages and towards the job of making photos.

That day is today.

The magazine is done and now I have about four months to go out there in the world and live the snowboarding life before we start the whole crazy thing up again. We got a presentation from our head of circulation today and we are successful. That feels good. It feels good to know this thing can stand on it’s own two feet and walk. We made something and that’s cool.

So now it’s time for SIA in Vegas and then out into the world. First stop, Canada. 10 days with Travis Robb and Standard Films. Can’t wait.

See ya in the mountains.

Tags: magazine making, plans

It’s been awhile since I’ve been able to sit down and write. Life has been throwing me one thing after another lately. I overbooked my Holiday’s to the point where I didn’t even feel like they happened, dropped straight into a photo contest and woke up on a plane to the east coast. Now I’m back in San Diego, putting the final touches on our last issue of the year, and I have a chance to take a deep breath. I’ve said it before and I’ll say it again; “life is long and interesting”.

I know I missed about three quarters of the people I wanted to see when I was home. I’m sorry. (One day you’ll forgive me goodze…) I’m looking forward to spending lots and lots of time making it up to all of my friends. I can’t wait to spend hours over a good bottle of wine and a meal explaining why I have felt the need to be gone for the last couple years. I can’t wait to offer up a weekend trip away up to the interior to make up for all those summer weeks I missed. I’m just dying to sit around the dinner table with all of you and listening to all the crazy stories of times I missed. I’ll sit back and smile and imagine all the fun you had, and pretend I was there.

Most of all I can’t wait to give all of you a present. It’s the best thing I have to offer and I have only recently realized how valuable it is. It’s a bit selfish, because it’s the kind of present that I get as much out of as you all will. It’s sorta like when Homer got Marge the bowling ball. Anyway, the present is time. Soon I’ll have the time to give all you that I haven’t been able to. I’m dying to have time for my friends again.

Tags: Time