2007. This "Phantom" picture was taken in the rotunda of the Montana Capitol in Helena. The Rocky Mountain Choir (absolutely awesome) was touring high schools and had the opportunity to perform in the unique and wonderful accoustics of the Capitol building.

I also like the photo because I actually look a bit like a musician (or a wild man; take your pick). During (and since) the summer of 2008, I've been working to establish the Billings BoyChoir, finally realizing a dream I'd kept for years.

2004. Kathyrn and I during her second son's wedding reception held at Thanksgiving Place near South Jordan, Utah. Kathryn and I have known one another for years and there is certainly a lot more to be said about that... But perhaps I will save that for those who ask me about it.

2002. I have hiked in the Weminuche Wilderness Area of the Colorado San Juan mountains each summer since 1988. As the years have passed, the trails are becoming more difficult (I'm sure it's not me), but if you want to make a trip of it any summer, just ask. I know the trails very well and I do enjoy the view from the top (although I'm less and less appreciative of the work it takes to get there).

1972. Yes, I was a hippie, or at least I tried to be. This picture showed up in my senior yearbook. We were decorating the gym for the senior prom. I recall that this young woman didn't think much of me, but she was being a really good sport (and I was secretly delighted).

There was a toothpaste commerical that was airing on television around this time in which a girl would blow a kiss to some guy who would then turn his head just so, presumably at the impact of the kiss. It turns out that my head (and expression) were a perfect (although unintended) imitation. Neither of us knew this picture was taken until the yearbooks came out at the end of the year.

You see, now, that I was once your age, a long, long time ago, when the future was filled with nothing but hopes and dreams, and the past was too brief for regrets. We may not have been perfectly innocent, but we were certainly blissfully naive and rather less jaded. Enjoy these years–they are fleeting and nobody I know has yet figured out how to return to them.

1964. Taken from a family portrait made when I was 9 or 10 years old.

The world was enormous and very much unknown when I was a boy. There were few computers, no cell-phones and color television was a very expensive luxury. Video taken in Europe needed to be flown across the Atlantic before it could be seen by US audiences (that changed in 1966). I could go to the movie theatre on a Saturday afternoon to see cartoons, a couple news reels, a "short" and a feature film--all of that and a drawing for a new bicycle--nobody I knew ever won--all for only 25 cents.

By the time I reached high school, most of the theatres had closed and nearly-live war video from southeast Asia disquieted America's youth (and many of their parents who had grown up during the Second World War and then suffered the Korean Conflict).

1954. In the opening line of Charles Dickens' David Copperfield, the narrarator (David) records, "Whether I shall turn out to be the hero of my own life, or whether that station will be held by anybody else, these pages must show."

I was born in 1954 at a US Naval hospital in Washington, where my father was stationed. My parents were appallingly poor, but I didn't notice. Actually, children don't notice their poverty (or even wealth) until someone points the matter out, at which moment, their status too often becomes the driving influence of their lives.

I am quite sure that I am not the hero of my own life.