Open the shades to reveal the morning. You go to work and you walk, you talk, you breathe, and its all very normal. Your life is good and you use words like "content" and "balanced" and "happy" in too many ways to describe your current state of affairs to other people...Then it happens. An event, a person, a place, an awakening, a very obvious and singular moment of happenstance goes off like a depth charge and echoes throughout your existence and all of a sudden its clear; I'm not here to make myself happy. I think I'm here to make myself happy and its happiness that will lead to more happiness.

A happy dog chasing his happy tail.

And this moment passes and leaves behind a residue of change. You are exposed. You can't go back to being safe. I can't go back to living for myself. My own personal evolution. The big ball of string that is your life becomes untangled in that moment, that one smile, and for a second you see the truth. Its not about you at all. And it scares you because you've lost control over something you never had control over in the first place and you just realized it. But there's a happy ending for the happy dog because he's no longer living in the ignorance of chance. He sleeps easy knowing he doesn't need to wake up and chase his tail for his life's fulfillment...He can chase it for fun again.

This picture was taken by me when my sister graduated from the California College of the Arts in San Francisco in May of this year. I want you to notice a couple things about this picture. The gentlemen in this picture have the same:

1. • posture
2. • leg kick
3. • hand in pocket pose
4. • expression
5. • last name

So heres the secret...The one on the left is my grandfather, the one on the right is my dad... And these are two of the most heroic men on the planet.

So here's the deal... I'm going to start blogging. The more life speeds ahead, the more we lose track of our friends and family. I'm not going to be so pretentious as to expect you to want to read my scribbles... But I do hope that you get to know me just a little more so that the next time I see you, you don't have to open up with....

"Oh hey, man....good to see you....so you didn't marry that stripper? No? Ah, must have been that other Ryan...."

That happened yesterday, and as a result, this blog happened today.

I'm going to open up these first few blogs with a picture from past or present. I always loved those 'behind the photographers lens' articles, where some photographer from National Geographic or wherever writes about the situation surrounding his picture of a lion mawing on a gazelle. Felt like I knew the guy, like I could share a beer with him at the pub after hearing about how he had to spray lion urine on himself for disguise. So I'll start doing the same, telling you about my lion urine, and maybe we can share a beer later.


This picture was taken by my good friend John Hollister, in Padua, Italy around April 2005. We were studying and living in Rome at the time, and we took a 9 day trip up North to Venice, Padua, and Vichenza. Padua is home to one of the largest Universities in the world, with a student population easily topping 100,000. So one sunny day in Padua, right in the middle of my heroic attempt to grow a grimy Italian beard, we rent these bicycles for 3 Euro for a day in the hopes of blending in with the students.

My buddy Cameron was with us, and he was super stoked because he consides himself a "cycling guy". This basically means he rolls up his right pants leg and straps his Timbuktu shoulder bag tightly across his chest when he rides his street bike . So the cycling guy is all stoked, and we get these bikes and start riding through these narrow cobblestone streets and Cameron has his pants leg rolled up, hes got his Timbuktu across his chest, and he lights up a smoke and hes on top of the world.... Cameron then crashes spectacularly going 5 MPH. Cameron... Is pissed. The cycling guy does not crash unless hes doing 70 down a mountain pass against traffic, in the snow. Hes yelling at the bike. Hes kicking the bike. Hes cursing the bike. Hes still smoking, however. So somehow he collects his bike and his pride and we press on, and come upon the square where this picture was then taken. Later that night, we celebrated the Italian Independence day with 1000ml beers and took a walk around town with some local kids. After Padua we charged over to Genoa, Cinque Terre, and Nice to wrap up the northern tour.

No strippers involved, whatsoever.