Dear Jason,

You know that I'm not really the type for this sort of thing, but your mother insisted, and I don't have to tell you how that can be. I wanted to just give you the journal and let you be the one to create the literary masterpieces for yourself.

Grandpa used to always give us journals for our birthdays and for Christmas. I guess it never occurred to me until much later that this was kind of an atypical thing to give to your sons. Most journals they sell in stores have kittens on the front and little padlocks that don't really work with ribbons tied to them so you won't loose them. I don't know when human emotion started being a strictly female thing, but that's just the way the world simplifies things until they're within understanding, I suppose. But it was never weird to us, and I can say with a fair amount of confidence that they were among the coolest gifts I ever got as a kid, gazillion-dollar video game systems included. Although those were fun too.

I still have every one of those books, and no, I'm not going to tell you where they are, but I'll let you see them someday when I'm too old to care or to be embarrassed. That's where so many of our ideas came from, from the stupid things we used to scribble in those journals. And I suppose it's true that the other two were the ones pulling ideas for whole songs, whole albums in fact, out of those pages, but I did too. Just in different ways. I guess, indirectly, it was those journals that created and fueled our careers back then. I just realized that I've never thanked Grandpa for that. I call him when I'm done writing this. (You should call him too, by the way. You know how much he and Grandma like to hear from you.)

The journal, back then, was one of those things that I just did, that we all did, without really giving it much thought. I don't know when I realized that there was a definite Inside and an Outside, that we were all together in one, and the rest of the world operated completely differently in another. No one ever made fun of me for keeping a journal because all the people I used to hang out with kept one. See what I mean? It was kind of a neat way to grow up, knowing and understanding that anything you thought or did or wanted was good in some way, by virtue of the fact that it came from you. Because you were good, and that was the end of the story. There are times when I miss that a lot.

There are also times when I wish we could have raised you that way, but now it's just you, and there were so many of us then. Loneliness seemed like this completely absurd concept when you were surrounded by that many people. Or course, I learned much later that loneliness was possible there, that Isaac suffered the most as we got older, as sales dwindled, as he stayed tied to us when he wanted to do different things. But before that, there was always company, whether you wanted it for yourself or not.

Your mom and I thought we could have done it, had you homeschool with Abbey and Joanna when Isaac and Susan chose that for them, but we couldn't. Mom wanted different things for herself, and she wouldn't have had the time. And it's not that Susan wouldn't have been a great teacher for you. I really think she would have, but in my mind, it defeats the purpose of doing it at all if you're not doing the teaching yourself. I hope you don't wake up someday feeling resentful that we didn't bring you up the same way I was, in this big, isolated, bear-hug of a circle. As much as I like to talk about it now, it wasn't all good. And you know that.

The hard part, of course, was when that Outside and Inside used to clash, and they did all the time. You always like to ask me that horrible question, the one that I can never give you a really good answer to: When did you know that it was over? I still can't give you something definite and concrete, the kind of answer I know you want, and that you certainly deserve, but I can tell you that I knew it was happening when the clashes between Inside and Out became more and more frequent.

The Executives never used to talk to me, even though I was legally emancipated (Don't even think about it.) and technically, very much in charge of what was happening to us. They used to want to talk to Grandpa, to Isaac. They'd look right through me, right over my head, and it was always double talk anyway, these clinched, impressive sounding sentiments that no one ever really believed. The only time they ever told any of us the truth was when they talked to Taylor, even back then, when he was 16 or 17, and the most fragile-looking one among us by a long shot. I don't have to tell you how he is, how he looks you in the eye and demands that simple, baseline level of honesty. And because of that, no one ever lied to him and got away with it. That's why he can still do it, Jason. That's why the rest of us had to leave.

I know you miss him a lot. He's told me so many times that he wishes he had a son like you. And maybe he's never told you that, but you should know. Next summer, if you'd like, you can go to California to visit him for a few weeks. I know he's asked you to come before, and we've always said no, because you were too young, but Mom and I have been discussing it, and we think it's probably OK now. You're old enough to look our for yourself. So I suppose that's part of your birthday present too.

But I want you to write in the journal. Even if it's nothing, if you think it's dumb, if you think a feeling is too insignificant to be put down on paper. Because really, those are the important things. That's where you'll find the truest version of you, in the things you toss away too quickly.

Basically, I'm telling you to hold onto your inner-dork. And I know you have one, because you’re my son. And those sorts of things tend to be painfully genetic. (Look at Grandpa, for goodness sakes.)

Oh, and one more thing. Thanks to your Mom's little intra-familial campaign, you're going to be getting a ton of these letters. Read them all with an awareness of the following: Whatever Isaac tells you about me as a kid, It's all lies.

Happy birthday, Jason. I love you.

-Dad

p.s. Do you know how much it freaks me out when you tell me that you want to be a musician?