Mom's attic.

My mom and dad are getting a new roof installed this week, so my mom ventured up into the "attic" (which is really just crawl space filled with insulation) to empty it of all the stuff that had been tossed up there for lack of better storage options. There were some old scrapbooks and photo albums, which I took home to begin to digitally archive. Here are just a few random highlights.



Jeff and Jeanine, circa 1973



A rare San Jose snow day, 1976



Natural Bridges State Beach, early '70s (for our contemporary friends that wonder why they decided to call the place "Natural Bridges." Nowadays there's only one smallish arch left, and the one in this photo is gone.)



Halloween, Kirk Elementary School, 1978. Why my parents thought this was okay is quite beyond my capacity, although I'm sure I thought I was being incredibly clever. Note my pals in the classic "hobo" and awesome Close Encounters get-ups.



My sister, the ham. BAY-ham, that is. (I'm dying, here. Fortunately now that the writers' strike is over I'll get to stop writing my own material.)



My first major stage production - "Scrooge," at Pioneer High School, circa 1975. I was "Young Ebenezer," and my friend Buffy (next to me, in red) was my sister, Fan. We had to kiss, IIRC. I also had to sing "Where is Love?" alone on the stage. (I know that song is from "Oliver!," but I think this was a home-brewed production.) I thought the dude dressed up as the Ghost of Christmas to Come was the most awesome looking thing ever.



Jeanine, Jeff, and cousins Mark and Matthew, Christmas 1977. My parents were big on making it yourself. I once wanted these goldenrod-colored "Champion" brand shoes that must have been cool back around '75, and my dad got me some generic yellow sneakers and a pen and showed me how we could just write "Champion" on the side and it was just as good. Hence, my hand-drawn Darth Vader shirt. I remember wistful trips to Mervyns with my mom to buy cords, gazing longingly at the heat-transfer decal Star Wars t-shirt displays, wishing I could be like my friends with the cool Star Wars gear.



This is my cousin Cami. She died of Leukemia not too long after this photo was taken. I'm sorry that my wife never got to know her - she was a ton of fun. Once, we lip-synced Fresh Prince songs and made our own videos, for example. Though she was a "Camilla," we named our Camille after her.



This is my grandmother Thelma Baham at the sassy age of 18. We suspect Cami takes a lot of her personality and physical traits from her. She died before we were married, but I'm glad Jen got a chance to know her a little.

In other news, Cami's now 1! I'll post a photo of her first cake soon.