Here's Leo

As promised, a few photos.

Leo....

The new family...

Gram, Grandad and Leo...

Word is Katie, Jim and Leo are all doing well, if pretty much exhausted. They should be good to go home today. Sweet!

Welcome, Leo Gilbert!

My sister Katie gave birth last night to her first child. Leo Gilbert Masson clocked in at 11:22pm on May 31st weighing 8lbs, 3oz. And as an uncle I know I have to say the following, but nonetheless it is heartfelt: Leo is key-uuuuuuute. Wrinkled hands, big eyes and constantly smacking lips as if he is getting used to this mouth thing.

I wish I could say it was a day of pure celebration, but I would be lying. Those moments holding him in my arms today were bittersweet. It is hard, very hard, not to long. Hard not to wonder when it will be my child that I get to hold in my arms. When it will be Trish lying exhausted, disheveled and radiant in the bed.

And yet.... In the midst of the longing there was a sense of peace. Maybe it is just too hard to focus on negatives looking into the eyes of someone not even a full day old. Or maybe..., maybe Leo showed me my future. If so I am going to have to thank him one day.

If I haven't mentioned already he is amazingly cute. And I will prove it to you after Dad sends the promised pictures.

"Gentlemen, to evil!"

Clarke had a quick trip into town last night, so I skipped out an All Saint's volunteer banquet and had dinner with him and Chris and Gary. Chris and Clarke are friends from high school and Gary from the early Seattle days. I don't think the 4 of us have hung just on our own since the night before my wedding, 3 1/2 years ago.

There was a stretch back in the early 90's when we were hanging out almost every night. Gary and I were having career issues, Clarke had just failed the bar exam by a handful of points and Chris was back from grad school, a couple of papers shy of his Master's Degree and rejected from the Ph D program. So we had many a long night playing Risk and Illuminati and Caveman Games while Chris was reassuring us, "Yes, we're failing, but we're failing at a high level."

Since then, Clarke has been running his own law firm in Wenatchee, Chris is managing the technical writers at Adobe, and Gary recently left a long stint at Real to finish his undergrad degree and head to law school. All three have great children. Long way removed from our high level failings. (Then again we found out that some points are not far removed at all, as Chris is still pissed that he was the only one who did not get bumped to first class on the flight home from Hawaii ten years ago.)

It was one of those nights you sometimes have with old friends where the years apart fall away and you feel like you were here last only a few days ago. The conversation immediately slips into its old rhythms, but is not relegated to simple reminiscence, or even catch up on events, but the mixture of celebration and support that come from your best friends. They are good men and I am lucky to be their friend.

And the best news was that Chris' son Keaton had a clean MRI on Thursday. He is showing no signs of recurrence of the brain tumor, two years port diagnosis. Apparently the odds of recurrence drop dramatically at this point. He will still receive regular MRI checks and his physical and speech therapy continue, but he is now considered a long term survivor. Nothing much that can be said about that except a deeply heartfelt "Woo-Hoo!"

Documenting a Life

Wow. A man takes a Polaroid picture every day for 18 years until the day he dies. (h/t dakwallah)

Looking through these and seeing his days of humor, of joy, of grief and of humdrum.... It seems like whenever I get too focused on the negatives in my life, something always turns up to help refocus me.

We all have our griefs, greater and lesser. The trick it seems is to keep living your life and finding - or making - the days of joy anyway. That I think is the ultimate goal behind the No Complaints attempt. Not that we should never ever complain, but that we - I - can let the complaints overwhelm everything else and then lose sight of all the reasons to celebrate.

Complaining

I would be well past 21 days since the last wrist switch if I had not taken off the bracelet a couple of weeks ago. I have not written, or talked, about this much at all because this one is pretty personal. The short version is I took it off the day Trish and I found out yet again that she was not pregnant.

There might be a longer post about this in a few days. Basically Trish and I have been trying for 2 years and the continual cycle of caution, optimism, excitement and disappointment is really starting to wear me down. Wear both of us down, obviously, but then Trish has expressed her feelings better than I ever could.

For me, the disappointment is starting to seep into every aspect of my life and I am finding little enthusiasm for my job, the projects I am producing or any creative activity (one reason blogging has been so sparse recently). I find myself holding back from friends and family because I do not want to talk about it with them (for any number of reasons).

The good news is that Trish and I are staying connected and keeping our relationship strong. We are taking steps to help us through the emotional stuff as well as the physical. (Of course that has been a source of frustration too, as one ten week group counseling program only allowed husbands in four of the sessions... cause ya know husbands are only 40% invested in the process.)

So anyway, I am complaining again. Not going to pick up the bracelet again for a while. But I would recommend it to anyone interested. At the very least it helped become very aware of the multitude of times I complain and avoid taking any action. That alone was worth it.

Torture in America

More and more of the focus is bearing down on Obama and McCain, which is natural, I suppose. My worry, though, is that we will get so focused on replacing Bush we lose sight of what his administration has done. Which is tough I think because there have been so many problems and the administration refuses to cede an inch on any of them. But it is important to examine what has been done, so that we can begin to work our way out of it and - hopefully - prevent it from happening again.

Case in point. FBI agents tracked the torture they saw at Guantanamo and other detention centers and the higher ups did nothing about it. They committed torture in our name.

Diasgreement

Having a little online argument with Todd over on his blog. Thought I would import it over here and solicit some support because he is just so totally wrong. He said...
"I think a screening of Tombstone is in order. Only one of the best American films ever made. But then I really don't have an opinion or anything."

To which I tactfully replied...
"What the #$@*% are you talking about? Tombstone is a fun little movie but one of the best American movies ever made? How high are you? I think we need to see your list of best American movies to determine if committal is necessary."

He then goes on to list a variety of reasons why it is such a great movie. But my point is...
"The movie is good. But there is no way you can call it one of the best American movies EVER. Better than which classic? Kane, Casablanca, Waterfront, His Girl Friday, The Apartment, Godfather, Apocalypse, Star Wars, Badlands, MASH, Graduate, Midnight Cowboy, Raiders... how many is that? 13? Off the top of my head! It is not even Kurt Russell's best - he is better in both Big Trouble in Little China and The Thing."

And that is why I am so very right and he is so very wrong. I say Tombstone is an under appreciated film. A good solid movie. No way, no how can you call it one of the best American films ever made. So please feel free to chime in here. Other American movies better than Tombstone.... go.

UPDATE: Poor, poor Todd. After taking up my challenge with smack talk that "It's on like Donkey Kong!" (yeah, he is a geek) he concedes the point in the same comment....
"Would you have been happier if I'd qualified it as "one of the best American WESTERNS"? 'Cause I'd still put it up alongside The Professionals, The Searchers, The Magnificent Seven and anything John Ford, Howard Hawks, Sergio Leone or Clint Eastwood have done."

Big difference between best American movie and best American western, so I will take the victory and move on completely satisfied. He is probably giving Tombstone too much credit, but my knowledge of westerns in general and that period on history is slim (part of his love for the film is its historical accuracy), so I will not argue it.