My daughter Mia in her natural habitat, mid-2000s. We once were given tickets to the Lakers and it turned out to be the historic game where Kobe scored 65 points. She read a book through the whole thing. She knows what she likes.
My wife’s grandmother in the back, father in the foreground, Newark, early ’60s. This episode is about sexism and it was pretty Mad Men back then.
Church theme! This is me looking super-serious on my way to receive my first communion. It meant a lot at the time. Now I look like this mainly when boarding a plane.
My wife finding serenity in the middle of a million people. She always looks on the bright side of things. They say opposites attract.
In keeping with the episode’s birthday plot, here is my mom presenting me with a cake for my 6th. If you look closely it appears that we had cupcakes as appetizers?? Life was better then.
To go along with our car buying episode, a late ’60’s pic of my then tween wife with her dad, checking out the coolest Mercedes ever. Why aren’t we all driving this car today?! What happened? Camelot lost.
Thematically this photo embodies the feeling of exhausted achievement our main character Penelope has at the end of her long call with the V.A. In reality it is my son Will after a climb up a small pile of rocks. But it looks like he vanquished all his enemies, so I went with it.
This photo doesn’t relate to the episode but is a famous one in my family. My grandparents had paid off the mortgage and my grandmother (lower right) is leaning down to burn it in an (out of frame) fireplace. My dad decided to do the old “WAIT!!!” gag just as the photo was snapped. Since only a few of us know the entire context, it just looks like my dad went insane.
A late ’70s shot of my brother Dan getting a birthday gift of tickets to see his beloved Dodgers for the first time ever. Reminded me of the moment in the episode when Elena gets her answer in the mail. Or of anybody wearing an Izod shirt back then, those were the shit!
When I’m trying to ingratiate myself with my wife and being very obvious about it, I will occasionally adopt an “angelic” pose. Look, that’s her cross to bear. Here is Mia imitating me and damn if she actually can pull it off.
Years ago I took a photo of Will on the first day of baseball, the moment before he caught… something? Why isn’t he wearing a glove? Is anybody in charge of this kid? I guess I was snapping a picture of when I was a terrible parent.
From my grandparents' cottage on Lake Ontario. Patriotic, romantic and bleak like the episode.
As Lydia once said “hashtag no filter!” Mia at our house and the mood fits the finale. ❤️
Here is my own papito in full pre-turn glory. He's still a great kid. Just replace the Legos with a bass and the t-shirt depicting his preschool with one sporting a probably obscene rap lyric.
My sister Katie's first day of kindergarten. No one, including her, has liked school this much since.
Years ago at Disneyland, my son and his cousin Eli being adorable/exhausted.
Look sometimes your dad is about to take a cute photo and then he's like "wait what if I made this THE CUTEST PHOTO EVER??" and that's when your dad duct tapes some leaves in your hand.
My daughter and her best friend since kindergarten AKA the "just friends" version of Elena and Syd. By that I mean NERDS.
Me at my temp job at Citibank in NYC, 1988. This photo is a Where's Waldo of 80's things. The hard drive under the Mac held a cutting edge 20MG of data, or as it is known today, a song.
My dad assistant-coached all my youth hockey teams. I'm on the ice somewhere falling.
My wife and her grandpa, 1960s. At the end of this episode I just wanted to see a happy little girl.
At the end of THIS episode, I just wanted to see a scene of tranquility. That's my niece Maddie at the end of the dock, taking in the world.
Me the day I moved out of my parents' house and went to live in New York City. The bike was stolen almost immediately.
Mia and another good friend Emma on a hike our families took together. Mia loves Emma as much as she hates hikes.
My grandmother, overcome with emotion at a birthday celebration. Exactly what she is crying with happiness about has been long forgotten but suffice to say in this way I take after her.
Did you watch this episode? Whew! Now enjoy the beach with my mom. ❤️
I am not Cuban but I do come from an extremely large Catholic family and here are some of them going off to church. My mom is 4th from the left, rocking a sweet hat.
Here my daughter enjoys a book. She’s not a big fan of “outside.”
This is my wife a long time ago after figure skating class clearly ready to put her dog on skates for the win!
This is my uncle George, my mother’s hermano, after a successful fishing trip. These fish existed in that lake back then!
My brother never got into weed in his youth like Alex does in this episode, but you can see in this picture with my grandfather, he had his vice: Bubble Yum.
Just my wife and I kicking back in Italy while she pictures me with a full head of hair.
My sister Jenn never pursued professional softball but she took a hell of a softball picture.
My sister Katie and my brother Dan in front of our rusted out old Impala before we upgraded to a station wagon. Do you get the reason this photo is here? “DRIVES me crazy?” Picture of a car? You’re welcome.
For the Anxiety episode I wanted to find a tranquil image and so here are my grandparents and their flower garden.
This is my dad and his dad. His dad ran a clothing store for over 50 years and was nothing like Schneider’s dad. And my dad is also nothing like Schneider’s dad. Thank goodness!
The photo relates to this episode in that I’m pretty sure my brother and my cousin pictured here were super drunk when they moved the bunkbed down to the dock of our family cottage to sleep.
This episode was harrowing and therefore needed a comforting image to close it out - here’s my brother and I and my grandparents’ dog back in, oh I guess 1840?
Penelope’s personal triumph in this episode is 2nd only to my son’s in this picture after having knocked down I’m gonna guess 6 pins?
Usually I try to make sure the backstory of my end card has a tether to the episode story, but in this case I’m so damn happy to be back that I opted for the cutest picture I could find. This is our 4th cat Bella who we discovered abandoned in our neighbors’ bushes when she was only 4 weeks old, and now sleeps on my feet every night.
This is my dog Bruce on HIS old couch
I am not Cuban but I do come from a large Catholic family. My mom was one of 6 kids who grew up to have 20 kids who grew up to have 40 kids and well, you get it. We all still get together in my grandparents’ 2 room spartan cottage on Lake Ontario. Here’s a photo of my cousins from back in the 80s - this is about as much room as we ever had to ourselves.
My best friend Stuart and I about to go trick or treating in the 70s. We weren’t very creative when it came to Halloween, but we made up for it by also being unenthusiastic
My wife was apparently an aspiring fashion photographer. She is now an architect but still very fashionable.
A few of my hermanos and/or primos with my abuelo
This must be around 1945 or so - possibly after WWII ended. My great uncle Elwood with my uncle Phil sitting on him because that’s how kids respect your service.