I moved to Los Angeles, which was as much of a pants-shitting endeavor as one could imagine at 18 years old. I went there to join The Groundlings. I didn’t tell anyone. It coincided with my first day of college — I walked in and kind of looked around and said, “Nope!” And I went back, got in my old Jeep YJ, and drove across the border — said I was getting gas in Blaine, Washington — drove across the border, all the way down to Los Angeles. Got outside the Highland Gardens Hotel and got my bags out of my Jeep, went inside, came back out, and my Jeep was gone already. Like, “Welcome to Los Angeles.” Found it two blocks away. They stole my doors. I always thought, like, Oh, I could still go to college. If this all, you know, ignites in a glorious flame of failure, I can still drive my doorless Jeep back to Vancouver. Having a plan B was always a good thing. 

The reason why I got into F.D.R., and presidents, period, was because I wasn’t able to make a school trip in third grade. I think it was because I was behaving bad. So I had to sit in the principal’s office ’cause I think the whole third grade went on this trip, and there was just books to read, and I read a book about Eleanor Roosevelt. But, like, from the first page I saw that we had the same birthday, and I guess that really excited me. So I just started reading about Eleanor Roosevelt. Every time I’d go to the library, I wanted to read about her, and then I started getting into her husband, and then I just started reading forever about presidents. 

I remember once, Henry, our older son, was watching [Seinfeld], and I came in, and first of all, I got sucked into it ’cause he was howling laughing. And then I started laughing, which is fun. But what was amazing, I couldn’t remember what happened in the story. So I sat there, and then I think it turned out to be the, it might have even been “The Contest” episode. Anyway, I left because it was inappropriate for me to be watching that with my then 16-year-old boy.

Back then, there were no rap records, so everything was tapes. People would go to parties in New York and literally hold a radio up for an hour and record the party, and then they would copy to cassettes, and that was how rap music went viral before we knew what “viral” was.

I keep going back to this one episode when [my son] was like four. They were doing away with the Space Shuttle program and they announced the final launches are taking place. And I thought, “Oh crap, I’d love to see.” So we go down there for, I think it was the second to the last launch of the Atlantis, and they really put on a show.

So they put you on a building, and they have snacks, and you get to watch, and it’s, The countdown is, and then there’s a hold, then, No, the weather is good. The place is surrounded with former shuttle astronauts who kind of concierge. And now it’s time for launch. So we’re all out there on the deck and we’re about a mile away from the gantry, and I have my binoculars and the thing is lighting up and they tell you you’re going to feel it in your chest before, and you do. And so now I’m glued to the binoculars looking at the Atlantis, and just things are shaking and trembling and orange balls. And Harry is standing right there. And he said, “Dad, can I have a look?” And I said, “No.” And I just thought, Jesus, what’s wrong with me? What kind of an asshole says no to their four-year-old son? But I couldn’t take my eyes off it. So do I deserve to be alive? No.