More trip pictures

Jasper consults with Pop, his great-grandfather.



Amy, Mom and Pop (Jasper's great-grandparents) laugh as he tries on Charlie's hat. Charlie is a doll kept in Mom and Pop's toy cabinet that at least three generations of McFall kids have played with it. This was Jasper's first turn.



Pop and Jasper couldn't escape the "Poparazzi."



On another visit to Mom and Pop's, Jasper naps with his mom before the mantle full of the grandchildren's (8) and great-grandchildren's (5) Christmas stockings. Jasper's is the littlest one right in the middle.



Cousins Lily and Sophie had fun playing with Jasper.



Amy's parents' house was kid central on one day of our visit. From left: Angie (Amy's sister), Amy, Leigh Ann (Amy's cousin) and Erin (Amy's cousin-in-law) and all their kids. Jasper -- the only boy in this bunch -- fears cooties.



Jasper with my parents.



Jasper with Amy's parents.

More from Calexico

Joey Burns does another of my favorites, "Not Even Stevie Nicks." Takes a while to load, but well worth the wait.

Snowy homecoming

Merry Christmas

Amy and I will be smiling as big as Jasper is here if we get home tomorrow.



We've enjoyed our extended stay in Oklahoma during the holidays (more on the trip -- including more pictures -- later). What was supposed to be nine-day trip turned into a 13-day one when a massive snowstorm buried Portland and prevented us from flying home as planned. The upside, we had more time with family in the comforts of their homes. The downside, we're exhausted and fried after nearly two weeks of living out of suitcases with a baby in tow.

Here's hoping we make it home for Christmas -- and are able to pick up Wiley first thing on the 26th!

My 2008 playlist

This year's list didn't receive as much deliberation as last year's. Nonetheless, here are 15 songs I found myself listening to over and over this year (and as with last time, the songs weren't all released this year):

1. "The Wolves (Act I & 2)
Bon Iver; For Emma, Forever Ago
Dan and I caught them live at one of the few shows I made it to this year. This song has a sing-along that hooks me every time. It's better still in person.

2. "All the Wine"
The National, Alligator
How can you not love a song with lines like, "I'm a perfect piece of ass" and "I'm a festival" in the first verse?

3. "Fade"
Calexico, Hot Rail
Q and I finally caught this band (one of my favorites) live -- the night before Jasper was born. Although they didn't play this song that evening, it is the one I find myself returning to as I listen to their material. The jazzy undercurrent to it all entrances me.

4. "Golden"
Red House Painters, Old Ramon
Another one linked to Q, who introduced me to this band just in the past month. The whole album has a feel, to me, like another of my all-time favorites, Big Head Todd and the Monsters' Midnight Radio.

5. "Cath..."
Death Cab for Cutie, Narrow Stairs
Just because.

6. "Random Rules"
Silver Jews, American Water
Had me from the opening line.

7. "Say It to Me Now"
Glen Hansard, Once (Music from the Motion Picture)
Loved the movie and the album, but this is the one song I can go back to time and time again without feeling too sugary sweet. A little yelling never hurts.

8. "Hasir"
Modeselektor, Hello Mom!
Found this in one of my Radiohead benders. Thom Yorke recommended the band in a podcast he participated in. Good for the gym, among other places.

9. "Your Hand in Mine"
Explosions in the Sky, The Earth is Not a Cold Dead Place
Came across this -- and loved it -- this spring. Then a co-worker died and his children, who are about my age, had this as one of the songs playing as people filed into his funeral. Completely changed how I think about the song, but still a favorite.

10. "Hold On, Hold On"
Neko Case, Fox Confessor Brings the Flood
Casey introduced me to Neko by saying something along these lines, "If God had a voice, she'd sound like this..."

11. "Come Pick Me Up"
Ryan Adams, Heartbreaker
Hard to go wrong with this guy. Really need to get to one of his shows sometime.

12. "Go First"
Damien Jurado, Caught in the Trees
Another of Q's tips.

13. "Outfit"
Drive-By Truckers, Austin City Limits Music Festival (2003)
Reminds me of where I grew up. I liked it before Jasper's birth. I like it more now that he's here.

14. "Love and Some Verses"
Iron & Wine, Our Endless Numbered Days
Makes me think of Amy.

15. "A Change is Gonna Come"
Sam Cooke, 30 Greatest Hits - Sam Cooke Portrait of a Legend 1951-1964 (Remastered)
Thought about this song a lot in the run up to Election Day. Then the day this summer that about 75,000 people gathered in Portland to hear Obama speak (as documented by my colleague Bruce Ely below), I began to wonder if he and the future first lady might dance to it months later at the inaugural ball. I hope they will. Amy, Jasper and I will, I suspect, that night in our basement.



That's it from me. What'd you listen to this year?

The trip

We are back in Oklahoma for a much-needed vacation as well as a pre-holiday visit, spending the first part of the week with my parents in Norman and the second half of the week with Amy's parents in Edmond.

Good to bring Jasper back to see all his relatives (familial and otherwise, when it comes to my side) en masse. Good to see family ourselves. Weird, always, I think, to see how my hometown has changed for the better and the worse in the eight and a half years that I've been away. Weirder still to come back with our son to Norman, which makes me think of Bruce Springsteen's "My Hometown."

Last night me and Kate we laid in bed
talking about getting out
Packing up our bags maybe heading south
I'm thirty-five we got a boy of our own now
Last night I sat him up behind the wheel and said son take a good look around, this is your hometown

I had that conversation -- with myself, mostly -- oh, about nine years ago. I was getting out, one way or another. Not because of anything bad, but rather just because I knew there was more out there and I needed to go see some of it. Now, upon returning for a visit with Jasper, that's bittersweet in a way. This town was once mine, but it's not really anymore and it's not his, either, and I don't know if it ever will be.

Not that it should be, in my mind, though I know that drives a lot of people I love nuts. Whenever and wherever the time comes, 18 to 20 years from now, I hope Jasper goes out on his own to make his own way, to figure it out for himself, to make his own mistakes beyond the comfort of a safety net because I know how important that has been for me. I want him to know what's at his core -- Oklahoma, in some regards, yes, but the Northwest as well and who knows where else -- but to have the independence to stretch beyond whatever Amy and I have instilled in him and to make his own path wherever that will take him.

I think although I may communicate it a little differently than many, that's one of the goals for most any parent: To raise a child with all the love and support and tools they'll need to someday stand on their own. I know mine allowed me to do so -- even though my mother, in particular, hates it now. And I'm sure she's not alone in that.

Thing is, though, Oklahoma still feels -- to me -- too constricting. Right now, at least. Maybe that'll change someday. Today, however, I don't even know how I'd make a living here, how I'd feed my family. I drive around town and see storefront after storefront closed, in an oil-rich state that has thrived in eight years of an oil-driven administration. I see the hometown paper a shell of what it used to be, seemingly unable to adequately cover the big stories in its own backyard. I see the big local paper doing innovative things on some levels, things to be applauded and perhaps even emulated, but I also see it still lacking real depth and texture in its journalism. I see a hometown that, best I can figure, would hold one option for me -- a university job, if I could get one. A university job, no less, in a field in a state with a brain-drain problem. Regardless, though, at 31, I haven't been gone long enough, learned enough, experienced enough or simply had enough to settle for that.

I've caught up online recently with people I went to high school with, people who either stayed behind or already came back. Folks who -- and I don't say this critically because I'm certainly a creature of habit in my own ways -- are doing all the stuff we used to do 10 and 15 years ago. People who are coaching their kids in gyms they once played in themselves. People who are still invested in a football team to a wholly unhealthy degree. And I know it works for them, and I'm happy that it does, but it is not something I can imagine. It feels foreign to me, and part of that makes me sad -- not for me, but because I know others wish I felt differently.

Anyhow, I feel like on these trips I have to explain myself to some extent. So that was my attempt.

Now, for Karen in Stillwater (whose joy I've apprently been stealing due to my infrequent baby postings, my mom reports) and others wanting to see Jasper, here are some pictures of him with two of his aunts -- my sisters.


Jasper and Sarah.


Jasper and Chelsea.

Final mileage check

The (nearly) final tally on my bike commute this year: 2,044 miles since I started in early April. And if I do my minimum rides on the six days of work I have left this year after returning from vacation, that figure will rise to 2,080 miles. I hope to get in some full rides, though, and cap the year around 2,100 miles.

That, roughly speaking, is the distance between Portland and Dallas, Texas.


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Not bad considering I started out this spring as a complete novice unsure of whether I could do it and if so for how long.

Now, as the year nears its end, I'm completely hooked and know this is a commitment I'm going to stick with long term. I've found a great pleasure, relief and satisfaction in doing something that is entirely based on my strength and willpower. I've never felt healthier, stronger or better in general.

Some other numbers to consider:

By biking this year I...
- Avoided using 78 gallons of gasoline.
- Kept about a half ton of CO2 out of the atmosphere that driving would have emitted.
- Averaged, for the year, about 64 miles a week.

That last one disappoints me. I know some late nights and crummy weather dinged that figure this winter. I'd like to get that back up into the 70-mile range, if not higher. My goal, for 2009, is to get around 3,500 miles in. And I think I might talk to some of my more serious cycling friends and see if I can build up to my first century -- 100 miles in a day -- ride. In fact, I think I'll plan to tackle this one, the Portland Century, next August. Anyone want to join me?

Turmoil

For those nonjournalists reading out there, here's life lately in my work world.

Stunning.

But I find some small glimmer of hope in the site at the same time -- showing where we're headed, using new tools to tell the old stories.

Besides, I have every confidence we will figure this out.

Lesson learned

Riding the MAX last week with my bike in the rack.

I was shamed last week. And I'm thankful for it.

I've been riding my bike as my main form of transportation since this spring. I overcame my "Can I do this?" apprehension, my uncertainty about flat tires (sort of) and built up my riding desire all summer long so that I could push through the long slog that I know will be bike commuting through a Northwest winter.

But I had not learned proper care and maintenance of my bike. So after riding through two days of the first big storm of the season -- which caused flash flooding in parts of the Northwest but just dumped a couple of inches around here -- my very nice bike was very much hurting. It was squeaking. The gears were shifting hard. The chain sounded BAD. The pinnacle of my bike's pain was last Thursday night, when I had to stop atop the Interstate Bridge, spanning the mighty Columbia River, in a driving rain, in pitch black conditions, to take off my rain-soaked glasses and blindly make way down the span. The bike and I were worn out.

So Friday morning I rode in -- squeakily -- and quickly made my way to the bike shop. To be shamed, politely, as it turned out. But shamed, nonetheless.

I'm no indie Portland hipster/bike messenger who rides a fixie and has a bike chain tattoo around my forearm, but I'm proud of my riding habit. I'm healthier than I've ever been. I'm consuming less fuel than ever. I'm saving money. And I'm making the planet a little bit cleaner for my son.

I didn't know if I'd be able to stick to this, but I have and it's been nothing but satisfying.

But I can't ride my bike into the ground. I have to take care of it. And I was nervous about what that involved. It's only a bike, but I'm not the most mechanically minded guy and as such I figured I'd do more harm than good when I started fiddling with things.

Then I walked into the bike shop and explained myself.

"This is my first winter riding through," I said, "and I need to know how to take care of my bike."

The mechanic -- a guy who'd helped me before when I got a new, better set of Kevlar-lined tires -- was gentle but firm as I told him about this squeak that had somehow developed after two days of monsoon riding.

"Well," he said, "how should I say this? Let's just say there are two types of people -- those who take care of their bikes and those who, um, don't. Those who lube their chains once a year and those who don't."

And so began my lesson on maintaining my ride. I got a tutorial on the various concoctions available for keeping my chain in shape and how to apply them. I learned to gauge how much brake pad I have left. And at some point in the conversation, back amid the bike stands and tools and greasy rags, I heard the line that makes perfect sense but for some reason I had never before chose to hear: The closer you'll get to your bike the better you'll understand it.

Friday night I came home and (after Amy reminded me to slow down and enjoy some time with the family) brought my bike down to the laundry room in our basement and cleaned my bike from wheel to wheel, from saddle to pedal. It was therapeutic. It was a little like I was back working my way through college, detailing cars on what's ridiculously known as the Magnificent Mile of Cars in Norman, restoring the beauty in something. And it felt really good for a change -- at a time when my job regularly involves mentally exhausting 12- to 13-hour days -- to rely on my hands to physically improve something.

Better still, the bike didn't make a single squeak when I hopped on it Saturday. In fact, it rode like new.

Amy shot it, and it's not posed (or I'm sure this photo will play well in Oklahoma)

Five weeks old today...

... and I already have him working stories.



"I'm re-writing your lede."



Perhaps another future journalist in the making?

Vision

Here's hoping he doesn't get my eyesight. But if he does he might end up looking something like this...

One more from the weekend

The arrival of the grandmothers, part II

Amy's mom is here this week. She's giddy, too.

Pumpkin hunting

We didn't make it all the way out to Sauvie Island this year, but we did go for pumpkins today nonetheless.





Also, considering Mr. Baby's arrival, we won't get around to hosting the annual carving party this year. But it's a good trade-off, for sure. Though I think Jasper involves more cleanup. Next year, however, we'll resume the tradition.

Mileage check

I've cleared 1,600 miles on the bike so far this year, which is the equivalent of a trip from Portland to Lincoln, Nebraska. I'm doing well with the weather so far, and hope to keep at it and clear the 2,000-mile mark before the end of the year.


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Playing on the bed

The arrival of the grandmothers, part I

My mom was here to see her first grandchild last week. She was giddy.

A thought

I went on a cleaning spree while I was off the past couple of weeks. In sorting through one closet I found a bunch of cards Amy and I exchanged over the years. One - from back in college - had one of my favorite quotes on the back.

For all the knowledge that we will never succeed in the work of our lives, we must continue to choose to continue. For all the frustrations and fears that each of us has and will have in our short time, we must choose to pursue to the end of choosing the best we know for each other, and in that choosing, long and late, we will connect with each other.

-- A. Bartlett Giamatti

Seems fitting these days, in many ways at work and in politics, no?

Jasper's namesake

My mom flew in today (more pics on that to come; meanwhile, suffice to say she can't quit telling us she's in love with her grandson) and brought this picture of Jasper's namesake - Jasper Newton Prince Jr. (March 4, 1881-July 11, 1918). He is our Jasper's great-great grandfather on my father's side.

You can see from the markings at the top that the original, which hangs in my parents' house, is an oval-shaped print. And the line running through his hat shows how old it is because that's where the picture broke apart when they took it out of the frame years ago to make a copy.

I suppose in everyone's childhood homes hangs a long-gone relative's portrait from which, you'd swear, the eyes followed you when you got up in the night for a snack or to use the bathroom or maybe even to sneak out. This was that picture in my house growing up.

The hat.

The cigarette.

The buttoned-all-the-way-up shirt.

I mean, when you're about 13 years old, you think anyone who got their portrait made with a cigarette dangling from his lips, clearly, was a man not to be messed with -- much less to do mischief under the nose of in the dark of night. It's only tonight, so many years later, that I noticed for the first time the doorway or whatever that is over his shoulder. As a kid, I never -- ever -- managed to get past the face. As far as I was concerned, there was nothing but the face.

I wrote a little about Jasper Junior -- and his wife, whom I trace my Choctaw heritage back to -- in 2004. Here's the related passage, which gives a little more background on the man and his life:

Eliza Walker, my great-grandmother, is the bedrock of what I've always known to be my Choctaw ancestry.

Eliza, an original Choctaw enrollee who stopped speaking her native language as a child to avoid discrimination, married Jasper Prince Jr., an Irishman, in 1903 after meeting him at a church social. His family disowned him because of the interracial union.

Undaunted, Jasper and Eliza pressed on. They farmed the allotment that was one of the few benefits her roll number offered. They had seven children, and Jasper, planning for his growing family, borrowed against the land. Then he died in 1918 at age 37, leaving his wife with a row of mouths to feed and a stack of bills to pay.

A widow at 31 with children ranging in age from 6 months to 13 years, Eliza lost the land as she struggled to hold her family together. She persevered, though, serving as her brood's unbreakable bond through the highs and lows of the 60 years that followed.

She died in 1981 at age 94, a slight but commanding woman who always was the anchor of stability in the family.

In that portrait I can see some of the qualities that have come down from Jasper to his son Elmer to his sons Randy (my dad) and Darryll (my uncle), then to me and, perhaps, to this new Jasper.

Our Jasper.

Like I said, I could never get past Jasper Newton's face in the portrait as a kid. Now, it's funny, but I can't get past Jasper Elliott's face in front of me today.

I'm entranced by both. Just for different reasons.

If only...

... more people in OKC were this cool.

A few more pics (or The grandmothers are clamoring)

Some more pictures as my time off nears its end....

This was from back when we were at the hospital. Jasper likes to get a good foothold while nursing.

Also back at the hospital. The football hold -- as taught in baby class -- a position that is almost guaranteed to soothe the crying baby. Jasper goes for it almost every time.

Amy attempts to give me dirty (and I mean dirty) diaper-changing instructions. Wiley pays more attention that I do.

Jasper really likes to play with his hands. A lot.

All snuggled in to the wrap-carrier-sling-thing for a walk on this cool afternoon day. Within minutes, he's asleep.

Back from the walk, resting on the porch. Jasper sleeps in that pouch. Sleeps hard.

I attempt to soothe Jasper earlier this evening while Wiley's expression suggestions, "Crying? Again?" (Should've used the football hold.)

Then and now: Our friend Dina brought dinner tonight -- capping two weeks of dinners friends have brought us (What great friends! What wonderful food!) and while she and her boys were here they delivered pictures from Amy's baby shower that Dina hosted. I think in this picture Amy is remembering the whole ordeal that is pregnancy.

Jasper's first week*

A week ago tonight, we got into bed with Amy feeling contractions and thinking it still would be a few days before Jasper would arrive. Tonight, we are all settled at home with both Amy and Jasper next to me alternately sleeping and nursing.

The intervening days have been an exhilarating and exhausting roller coaster of emotions.

Before going into all that, however, here's a picture: Jasper in the car seat -- he really likes the thing -- preparing to leave the hospital (for the first time; more on that later). He's a long, skinny guy, but not as much as this picture suggests.

Let's start with the name: Jasper Elliott Prince. I don't know if folks are just being kind or what, but everyone keeps telling us they love the name. The first name was picked for family history. The middle name was picked for sense of place.

Jasper is the name of both my great and great-great grandfathers on the Prince side. A striking portrait of the junior (born March 4, 1881, died July 11, 1918) resides in my parents' house. Maybe we'll get a copy of it for our own home now. Personally, I like the name because it has a certain older feel, a Midwestern sensibility as my friend Q once said. Plus, I don't think we've met any other Jaspers.

Elliott we originally had in the running for a first name because we like Eli. Went around and around about the spelling. Settled on double l, double t in the end for a couple of reasons, I suppose, though just about any combination would have some symbolic ties to the Northwest -- where our Jasper was born. Elliott Bay is in Seattle, which is where I first thought I'd like to live someday if I ever made it to the Northwest. Eliot Glacier is on Mount Hood, which we see every day -- and I stop to look at as I ride to work. Elliott Smith is one of the musicians from the Northwest whose music I most like (though none of it is exactly happy baby-friendly stuff).


That's Jasper as he looked as I peeked in on him earlier tonight.

Again, about this time last week Amy's water broke and off we went. We'll spare you the gory details, but an epidural around 4 a.m. pierced something it shouldn't have, resulting in what the doctors called a spinal headache. Basically, the botched epidural resulted in spinal fluid leaking, which made her brain ache anytime she was upright. As a result, for most of the time between 4 a.m. Monday and about 4 p.m. Wednesday, she was flat on her back. With her feeling better, we came home Wednesday night only to realize the headache returned -- which meant even more time flat on her back while trying to feed the baby. So back we went to the hospital on Thursday to get what the doctors call a blood patch. They drew blood from her arm and injected it into the same spinal spot used for the epidural. The goal: have the blood, basically, fill the pierced dura and prevent more spinal fluid from leaking, thus ending the headache.

Bottom line: She's a helluva lot tougher than I am or ever will be. In the course of four days she had a giant needle shoved into her spine, gave birth to a nearly nine-pound baby, endured a debilitating headache and then had another giant needle shoved into the same spot in her spine.

She amazes me. As does Jasper, who helped me blog some of this in between feedings tonight.


* Note: Corrected namesake reference to great and great-great -- rather than great-great and great-great-great grandfathers. Sleepy.

A family picture

Our friend Dina visited tonight and snapped our first family picture while she was here.

More from Jasper-palooza

Jasper Elliott Prince

Our baby made his long-awaited arrival this morning.



Water broke at 12:30. To the hospital by 12:45. Epidural by 4:15. And out he came at 7:15.

He's a big guy -- 8 lbs., 13 ozs. and 20.5" long.

Whole thing seems like one intensely happy blur. Along with a lot of very sweet cooing and gurgling. Can't believe he's here. He's ours. And he's just stunning.

Measuring my ride

For months now, I've resisted getting a computer for my bike. This week, however, my friend Q led me to a new find that -- minus measuring the wattage of each pedal stroke or my heartrate -- tells me most of what I'd like to know about my rides. And, better yet for all those naysayers out there, it's on my iPhone. The TrackThing app is pretty damn cool. Here's a couple of screengrabs I clicked after getting home tonight.


The odometer is based on total riding distance today -- my usual length, if this thing is right is just under 14.5 miles, which is pretty much what I expected. The average and max speeds and pace are based on just the ride home. But here's the really cool part...

It charts my speed versus the elevation change over time. The big green spike is the worst hill of my ride. And you can see, it's definitely an urban ride with lots and lots of stop lights.

This morning -- again, if this thing is accurate -- I hit 30 mph on the downhill side of the Interstate Bridge while passing cars stuck in rush hour traffic. I've always wondered how fast I get rolling there, but never knew. Never would've guessed it broke low 20s.

Next up: 40 mph.