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I am assuming that if you're here you willingly accepted the offer to see photographs from my life. So, prepare to have your hard drive struggle to keep up with the graphics and the info overload. This page is the result of a very boring time in my life -- the weeks I was out of work after graduating college -- so I am not a narcessist or whatever. I swear. (I would also like to point out that I don't have a photographic memory; the dates the photographs were snapped are known to me now only because I have kept a journal on a fairly regular basis since 1992 and recorded down when these things happened.)
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Since this web page is dedicated to BTTF and all that, I dug up a picture of me from that memorable time period. So far as I can determine, this was taken in June or July of that year. I don't really remember that day -- I think my grandparents were visiting and maybe I was playing house or dress up or something -- but I suppose this snapshot will make people feel very old who know me. I was about halfway thru my sixth year on earth when Back to the Future arrived in theaters. And it seems almost like yesterday....
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This picture was taken during my family's first visit to a Universal Studios theme park, during out two week vacation at Walt Disney World. I was thirteen at the time and can be seen in the white hat; my brother was eleven and is the other human in the photograph. This was four months before the BTTF bug really bit me -- I had gotten faintly obsessed in '89 - '90 when the sequels came out -- and I suppose one might argue that the seeds of that were planted when I bought the first BTTF novel in the gift shop there. I do have vague memories of reading it on the airplane ride back. FYI, the animated cut outs aren't there anymore. I think they were there only during the duration of the animated series' run.
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This photograph is cool to me in a number of ways. One, I am still friends with all the people in the picture (except one, Kellie, who moved away and lost touch). Two, it shows how geeky we all were back then. Yes, that is me on the first row, lower left. I was quite the awkward duckling in my teen years. A year and a half later I lost thirty pounds by not eating candy bars for lunch anymore, tossed the glasses for contact lenses, grew my hair out, and dyed it the color I was meant to have, but God messed up -- auburn. I've been that shade so long, now, that many of my current friends never knew I wasn't a natural at it. Clockwise from me is Rachel, Kellie, Becky, Kama, and Kathleen. Our original little freshman-year clique, minus Poncho and Mike, who were standing just outside the range of the camera lense.
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In August of '96, when I was seventeen, my family took our last (to date) family vacation to Walt Disney World in Orlando, Florida. Me being the BTTF fan I am, I persuaded the parents to stop at Universal Studios Florida, as had been our tradition the previous two vacations (in '92 and '94). This photograph of me was snapped by my mom as I stood before the steam train time machine. Gives one, I suppose, a good idea of the approximate size of the thing when in relation to Marty, since I was about 5'5" then. (I have since grown an entire inch. Wow.) This picture also had the distinction of being the only one of me on my web page when it first came about in the summer of '96.
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My senior prom happened on this late spring evening. As my high school was small and "alternative," a ACHS prom was not your normal kind; we actually had ours held in the school's "cafetorium." The guy/girl ratio in the school was pathetic--for every 3 girls, there was probably one guy. Therefore, none of my friends had dates, so we decided to go stag in a group.
En route to the dance from dinner, I stopped my car to check out this red DeLorean that had been sitting out on a collector's car lot for a few weeks. In jest, I said we should get in the lot so I could get a picture with the car. So my two friends and I jumped the fence in our prom gowns and heels and I posed for this picture. It was pretty fun!
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I graduated high school on this date, and after the ceremony I posed with three friends who still had another year to go: (L - R) Brynne, Kimberly, and Marissa. I was quite happy to be all done.... for four months, anyway, when I then began college. The night of graduation was pretty fun, with party hopping and bonfires and reminicing and speculations about the future. Ah, nostalgia-dripping memories, sniff....
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This picture was taken at Universal Studios Hollywood, during my "Graduation Trip" to Los Angeles with my mom and my aunt Louise. During the 6 or so days we were there, we hit Disneyland, spent two days at Universal Studios, and saw the TV show "Caroline in the City" tape. The first day at Universal, we happened upon a dog from the animal actor's show, where patrons could get pictures with them and the like. This one was considered Benji, but to me he really looks a lot like Doc's dog Einstein, with the same markings and the like. So I will pretend that's who he was. And, y'know maybe it was the same dog -- I never did find out the animal's real name. Friendly little guy. And I'm laughing 'cause those licks tickled!
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This snap shows me with my mom and aunt in the front seat of the DeLorean in ...The Ride, shortly before take off. I'm on the far left, my aunt's in the middle, and my mom is on the far right. Who knows who those kids are behind us....
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During the two days we visited Universal, I went to the Back to the Future Special Effects Show -- since disbanded, sadly -- twice and both times was picked to be "Jennifer" in the demo -- meaning I got to sit in the passenger seat of the same DeLorean gimble used in the films, screaming my head off while "Marty," a kid of about ten both times, cranked the wheel back and forth while they recreated the 2015 flying scene. It was awesome fun! After the demo, we ditched the rest of the tour group to linger behind alone and my aunt and I climbed in the car for this photo.
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This picture was also taken at USH during the same day. I couldn't find the DeLorean the first day, so the second day I was there I asked this guy in a shop and he told me where it was -- way, way in the back, where there was, like, no one around. (In the area where, now, they have the Terminator 2-D ride.) The Flintstone's car was next to the DeLorean, and it was getting more attention! Sad. So it was fairly easy to get my picture snapped with it. Notice my "Marty McFly" sneakers -- I found those in a store the summer before the trip.
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This picture was snapped at the birthday party of one of my friends, the gal seated before the cake. Pictured are all high school chums that I still see and hang out with on a regular base. This picture is a favorite of mine -- perhaps because it's extremely rare to get pictures of group shots. Anyway, the identities of these people: bottom row, seated, L - R, is Kama, Rachel, and Kimberly. Standing, L- R, were Brynn, Amber, me, and Becky. Some of these people actually had characters based on them in some of my BTTF stories, so looking at them you can see how good or bad I was with written discriptions of their appearences! (Bad, according to them, who were somehow offended. Sigh....)
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This was taken on Halloween night at my college dorm, McClain. We had a cool party, with a murder mystery game that I had planned and executed. For my costume, purchased for a grand total of $10 at the local Goodwill in Eugene, I was a "Dead Prom Girl from the 80's" who died a tragic, unspecified death on her prom night.
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During the winter term of 1999, when I was a college sophomore, the guys in my hall -- from the current time and the year before -- became obsessed one Saturday evening in creating a human pyramid. Seriously, they spent about four hours in trial and error doing this. The photograph represents the most people we could manage to get up, before the ceiling created an unavoidable interference. It was great, scary fun being up near the top, as I was. Kids, don't try this at home!
Left to right, bottom row--Reid, Dan, Chris, Bryan, Justin; second row--Jeremy, Randy, Richie, Kellie, Chris (standing); third row--Mike, Andy, Travis; fourth row--Julie, Me; top--Katie.
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This picture was taken the same night as the one above, a kind of improvisational group shot as we were trying to figure out who would be where on the pyramid. Not all the people in this picture are in the above one, however, and vice versa, and some people in my dorm have identical names. Notice our lovely dorm lounge in the background!
Left to right, front and center--Katie; row behind her, L to R--me, Andy, Julie, Travis; third row, L to R--Erick (in glasses & white t-shirt), Josh (in grey shirt), Jeremy (big toothy grin), Dan (checkered shirt), Reid (blue shirt); fourth row, L to R--Dave (white t-shirt), Bryan (peeking over Josh and Dave's shoulders), Chris; in back row, L to R--Richard with Mike on top of his shoulders.
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I went to the Oregon State Fair (held every year in Salem, Ore.) with three of my friends and they were taking pictures of people in a "Got Milk?" ad campaign search. After snapping a picture for their files, one got a Polaroid to keep for their own. And it was free, to boot. What the heck? By the way, that stuff on my upper lip isn't milk, but a vanilla milkshake. Ah, the secrets that you learn....
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At the same State Fair, I also decided to finally fulfill a lifelong dream by posing in period costume at one of those little photo booths. My choice? A Old West saloon girl, natch. I had the choice between holding a whiskey bottle, a gun, or a fan, and I chose the more conservative route. (Though I was tempted by both the other props.) I was planning on keeping a serious face in this picture, since most people didn't smile in photographs back then, but when the guy told me to smile, I just did it out of instinct.... That, and the fact women generally didn't wear hats like that indoors and while dressed like that, were my only complaints with the picture. I find it rather amusing, and it was a blast to do.
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Same night as above, just a more full length view of the costume, complete with the important fax from my collection. (It's a reproduction, not the real deal.)
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After my roommates and I got into costume on Halloween, we went across the street to meet our friends and posed in a group shot. From left to right: me, Kristie, Tammy, Erika, Jenny, and Kiyo.
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These were my two roommates, with me, my junior year. The picture was taken in February 2000 after a fun evening of dinner and a play in Eugene. I'm on the far left, Erika is in the middle, and Jenny is on the other side.
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This picture was taken at Walt Disney World in the Disney-MGM Studios while I was doing my tour of duty in the College Program. Michael J. Fox had apparently visited MGM in late April of 2000, roughly a month before I arrived (D'oh!), but his handprints were dated from late May, 1999. I did put my hands in them natch (which is captured in another picture). His hands were a bit larger than mine, believe it or not.
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This was also taken in Orlando, Florida, during the summer of '00. Two of my friends from high school, Kimberly and Melanie, flew out for a visit in the first week of August, shortly before my program ended. I took a week off work (which I put in for almost as soon as I got there in late May) and we had all sorts of fun on a "real" vacation at Walt Disney World (as opposed to driving somewhere in Oregon and camping overnight, which is all the trips we'd taken before). Pretty cool for something that was just a lark of a comment the eve before I left. ("You guys should come visit me!") Even they were stunned that we had managed to pull such a thing off.
Anyway, this picture was taken in Kissimmee's Old Towne, where they have this photography shop where you can dress up as either Civil War-era people, Old West people, or 1920's people. We decided to do saloon girls and posed for several pictures. I bought three of 'em, and this was one where we were supposed to look all serious and menacing -- like most people did back then in pictures. I'm on the far left, Kimberly's in the middle, and Melanie's on the right.
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After growing my hair out for seven years, I finally decided to cut it to a more contemporary bob. I'd never had hair that long before and I kind of liked the novelty of it, especially since most of my friends were hacking their's to their shoulders or above the last few years. But I'd decided to cut it to a more "mature" style when I graduated college as a symbolic coming of age thing. (I also was sick of people thinking I was seventeen, too.) Who knew that I would get fed up with the long length a few months beforehand? I didn't tell anyone that I was going to cut my hair "like Rachel's on 'Friends'," as I very rarely genuinely surprise my friends. Somehow, I kept the secret for two months, and was rewarded by my mother screaming at the sight of it and my friends doing doubletakes. I'd like to add, too, that my hair does not normally look like this "after" shot -- that was the hairstylist's doing. I don't have the time or talent to tame my hair with a curling iron in the morning. The more candid pictures below or on the main profile page illustrates my hair on a "normal" day.
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This picture was taken over my final spring break, when three high school friends and I drove down about 1,000 miles to L.A. for a week. During that time, I think this is one of two photos I have that was taken with everyone in our party together, as we stood before the "Paradise Pier" portion of the recently opened California Adventure at Disneyland. (This part of the park also was my favorite.) Sidney, Melanie's son, is being held by Kama as Mel watches, amused, and Kimberly squints at the camera. I bring up the group at the far end.
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This picture sort of scares me, as it shows me with six of my pals from high school at a baby shower, almost exactly four years since our graduation. (Well, for almost all of us; Kimberly was a grade behind us.) I dubbed the three of us standing (without any children of our own) "The Three Sacraficial Virgins." Of the four who are parents, three have or will have two children in the next few months, and two are married. Standing, L - R: Kimberly, me, Kathleen. Sitting, L - R: Melanie (with Sidney), Brenda (with new baby McKenna), Becky (with son), and Rachel (with TaminKessa, or Tami, her daughter).
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About a week before graduation, one of my friends, Tammy, had a BBQ at her apartment that turned into a mini McClain hall reunion. Here's a shot of me with several of my good college friends. L - R: Me, Kristie, Erika, Tammy, Jenny, and Kiyo.
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The night before my college graduation, I got together with two of my friends, Jenny and Erika, for dinner, and afterwards we decided to check out the campus and figure out where the heck the School of Journalism & Communication ceremony was. (Both Erika and I were going to be graduating from there; Jenny still had two terms to go before she would be done with a CIS degree.) Anyway, it turned into this random evening of visiting old campus haunts and places of importance and posing for pictures with 'em. This was the picture that kicked it off -- as we drove to campus, we passed this sign at the Phoneix Inn nearby and Erika and I decided to mug for the camera with it.
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Me with my mother on the day I graduated from the University of Oregon. I suppose I put this picture up to illustrate the creepy point that I bear a strong facial resemblance to my mother. (My hair and eyes are darker, genes from my dad's side, and though I need glasses, I favor contact lenses.) Our voices are nearly identical, too, causing people to mix us up a bit over the phone. That ain't all; all the females on my mom's side -- her mother, her sister, her grandmother, etc -- look sorta like us, too. Reminds me of this little ditty by Thomas Hardy:
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One week after graduation, two pals from the college dorm, Jessica and Jason, married each other. It was the first wedding of my group of college friends, and the first wedding I'd ever been to where I wasn't in the wedding party! (This isn't saying much, as I'd only before been a flower girl in my aunt and uncle's 1985 wedding, and a bridesmaid in my childhood best friend's wedding in 1999.) Ironically, this date was some kind of red-letter one with a lot of people I knew; it was also my mom's birthday and the day a pal at home had her baby shower. L- R: Tammy, Jenny, Kiyo, Jessica, Erika, me.
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Having nothing better to do on a Saturday night, a couple friends and I decided to fork over about $10 to go to the Crystal Ballroom in Portland, which was having an 80's Costume Bash with The Retros (a local band that does 80's covers) and "special guest" Automotion. (They did that song "Obsession," kind of a one hit wonder thing.) Part of the fun required getting dolled up in 1980's costumes, so I hauled out my Jennifer Parker one from a few years before, finetuned it a bit, while my pals dressed up as nodescript 80's chicks. Here, I am posed with my friend from high school, Kathleen, who borrowed most of the accesories to her costume and still hasn't returmed 'em. (Not that I expect her to get the hint; friends of mine don't often look at my web pages, even if they're on 'em.)
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I was fortunate enough to have the opportunity to go down to FX 2002 in Orlando, Florida the weekend of February 16 - 17th and help out BTTF.COM in their booth. After being on the fan club's staff for seven years, it was really neat to finally meet the other staffers and people in person. I had a blast seeing the props, taking a ride in the DeLorean on display, and meeting Tom Wilson, who is such an incredibly kind, generous, funny guy. The second morning of the convention weekend, before the doors opened to the public, singer Joey Fatone from the band N Sync stopped by to meet Tom and see the booth, as he is apparently a fan of BTTF, and I was lucky enough to get a photograph with both men. Who would've thought?
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After that crazy, fun weekend in Orlando, I flew up to Ohio where I have family -- my parents both grew up there and moved out to Oregon in the 1970's -- for a long-anticipated visit. (I hadn't been back since 1990!) Aside from getting in touch with my family's past, and scoping out the midwest as a possible area that I'd like to move to when I finish grad school -- believe it or not -- I was able to spend a day with my writing mentor and friend, Mary Jean Holmes, and her husband, JR. JR grew up in the same area and his mother lived across town from my Godparents that I stayed with. So they drove down for a couple days and after a three year friendship and correspondence, we finally got to hang in person! (I now have this dubious honor of having met in person every single person I've had a long correspondence with -- a year or more -- through e-mail... which is far out considering how scattered those friends are!)
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When my first book was published, I made good on the promise that I had given the ten or so friends that had helped me out as "beta readers" -- people that read the first draft of the book and then responded in depth to about a two page questionnaire on the story. Their comments and insights were extremely helpful -- the book wouldn't be the same without it! -- and I told them that as compensation for their work and time, whenever the book came out, I would track them down to get them a signed copy and their name would be in the acknowledgement's page. I think none of them thought it would happen so soon....
Not all the people pictured here are beta readers -- out of the 10, six came to the special thank you dinner I had in a local restarant, where I distributed their copies. (Three live out of state, so coming to Beaverton was a bit... difficult.) The others here are friends of mine from high school and college who came to offer congrats and support. I was actually surprised at the size of the group that night; it made me realize how many good friends I have!
Let's see if I can explain who is who in this mob scene.... Seated, L-R: Chris, Mike, and Asa. Standing, L - R: Me, Nicholas (who also does the illustrations for the book and website), Erika, Dave, Tom, Jenny, Jenny, Melanie, and Kimberly. Whew!
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I have now had the dubious honor of being one of the first of my friends to get a master's degree. (The official title of my degree is a Masters of Arts in Teaching.) It also meant I've experienced 2 college commencements first hand. These brave, loyal friends came out to support me on my day of commencement since my family could not be there -- my parents had flown out to Alabama to attend the graduation ceremony for my brother, who was graduating from the Air Force Officer Training School as a second lieutenant the previous day. (I still think that one of them could have stayed behind for me, but I really don't want to think about that; I'm still upset from the shaft!) In their place came some close family friends, and the pals you see here: Jenny, Jenny, Erika, Nicholas, and Kimberly. (Props, too, for Sandy, Molly, and Darvin!) Thanks, guys! :-)
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Back in late July I got wind that Bob Gale would be showing his movie Interstate 60 (written and directed by him) at the Reno Film Festival. So, knowing how close Reno would be to my new home in California, a couple friends -- Nicole and Mike -- and I made plans to attend. Excitement mounted when it was revealed that not only would I-60 be showing (with Gale in attendence) but the original BTTF -- with Christopher Lloyd coming along as well! Sweet! This, I figured, was the universe's way of giving me a second chance not to wuss out at approaching "the Doc" in person.
Sadly, Nicole got sick last minute and could not attend, but Mike and I made the trek (in spite of questionable weather on the passes.) Here, we pose with Bob Gale.
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It's "the Doc" in the flesh. I was terrified -- so flustered I kept dropping things. I had Mike take a picture with my digital camera and film camera, and Mr. Lloyd was most gracious. In person he is very quiet, soft spoken, low key. Completely opposite of his characters. He also nicely signed a couple pictures for me -- one for me, one for Nicole -- and Mike's CD linear notes for BTTF.