The blog for anyone who’s ever wanted to quit this business—and didn’t.
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THE REVISIONIST.
Note: The film stills featured here have been re-imagined by cinematographer Keith DeCristo, framed in 2.35:1 and color timed independently of the original film release. These images represent an unreleased visual cut—an artistic expression of what might have been, had the original collaborators remained aligned.
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SE7EN DAYS TO CALI | Cross-Country Motorcycle Memoir
“I got the call, packed the bike, and left New York with 3,500 miles between me and what I couldn’t say out loud. A cross-country ride with ghosts riding pillion.”
ACT ONE: THE CALL
It wasn’t raining the day she called, but it felt like it had been.
I was knee-deep in a production job that had long since stopped being glamorous—long days, longer nights, and a schedule so brutal it made eating a luxury and sleep a rumor. The shoot wasn’t set to wrap for another week and a half. I’d been running on fumes and protein bars, the kind that promise “clean energy” and taste like regret.
My phone rang during a break that hadn’t been approved but wasn’t quite denied either.
Lilian.
She was the kind of woman you remember—long hair, deeper eyes, and a way of looking at you that made you wish you’d said smarter things. She used to watch me when I was a kid. Made me birthday cakes that probably rewired my brain chemistry. First crush, if we’re being honest. And though life had marched on in opposite directions, her voice still had a place in me that didn’t age. Back to the most important- the fact that she’s calling, and the news can’t be good.
“Bobby stopped chemo,” she said. “He only did one round. Yeah. He couldn’t handle it.”
There was a pause—those heavy, quiet seconds that carry more truth than anything you could say out loud.
“If you want to see him… you know, I think it should be now.”
No drama. No persuasion. Just that.
I didn’t need to think it through. I’d already missed enough. Enough weddings, birthdays, Sunday barbecues with plastic forks and unresolved family tension. Whatever. Someday.
Except, there was no room for a “someday.” Unless you mix in that classic reverb-echo that tells the audience it’s all a lie. Before now, death-bed requests were only in the books that I read or in the shows that I watched. To receive one now, to hear the request from the voice of a woman who is certain of a grim outcome, is a matter of a different kind.
Black and white photograph of a 1998 BMW R1100GS motorcycle parked in an urban alley with graffiti, shot on a Canon 7D.
GEAR CHECK
The GS- my battle-worn, winter-proof Bavarian beast- a sweet reward after directing something corporate enough to afford me a used track bike with character. Armored and lit up like a spacecraft, with TKC-80 knobby tires that were there bail me out of inexperience or bad decisions- and mostly to hop dividers in gridlock, or quickly make myself scarce when some of my juvenile antics caught the attention of traffic enforcement. I’m not suggesting that you can hide a 500lb, bright red adventure bike darting across sidewalk, but if I’m in the zone, you can’t really catch one, either.
Another blessing: maintenance had always been ritualistic. A mix of obsession, affection, and duty. I once asked a mechanic with many track and travel days of experience to pull from, how often he changed his oil, and he said without flinching, “every one-thousand miles. We’re always pounding on the throttle like a race bike. Act accordingly.”
Packing, as you might expect, was less “strategic planning” and more “get the hell out of Dodge with what fits.”
Both side panniers got clothing, which was not easy, considering the mixing of the seasons that I will encounter during my East cost to West coast trip.
The top rear case got bike and rider support items: tools, oil, zip ties, electrical tape, water. Snacks. More snacks.
My documentary/street beauty camera package rode pillion in a weather-sealed, low-key backpack- but I won’t find out later that I’d only take it off the bike into rooms where I slept- never to shoot.
And yeah… there was a woman from Kansas City, and though I believe this not the time nor place, let’s just say we spent a year breaking up, and I owe her an apology.
As expected, last-minute things ate into my 3 hour-buffer, and instead of leaving at 7am to beat traffic, I was wheels up at 11, right through the thick of it.
Dynamic rear view of a BMW R1100GS in motion on a desert highway under swirling clouds, shot with iPhone 4.
BMW 1100GS at a Valero gas station at night
BMW R1100GS at first light in the South West.
Motorcycle in Desert Gas Stop/Local Bar
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