My dad and me on Martha’s Vineyard. Swimming buddies.

My mom on the deck of the Vineyard house in 1975, a few months after I was born.

Me and Shana on the Vineyard, collecting tennis balls to stuff her bra.

Me and my sister, Simone, with her arm always around me, age three.

Shana holding me in Katama Bay, probably while I was peeing.

Chet and me in our backyard in New Jersey in 1979.

Celebrating my dad’s birthday, which he always claimed was on Thanksgiving—even though Thanksgiving is on a different day every year.

Shana smoking a pipe to try to fit in with me.

On an Easter egg hunt in Martha’s Vineyard, at age six.

Chet’s college graduation: Simone, me, Chet, my mom, and my grandmother, the German.

Me at nine years old, hugging our family dog, Mutley, who would become the prototype for all my future dogs.

My aunt Ellen, my father, and me at my brother Roy’s bar mitzvah.

My mom and me when I was eight. The year before Chet died.

My brother Glen’s graduation from college. The year after Chet died.

My father and me at my bat mitzvah in 1988.

My mom and me at a beauty pageant. I was fifteen.

With Simone at my high school graduation, still with her arm around me.

Me and my parents in Martha’s Vineyard in 1996, the summer after I moved to California.

My aunt Gaby, me, Simone, and Molly on our Xanax-fueled family vacation.

Visiting my dad at his old-age home in Pennsylvania.

Me and my sissies in San Francisco.

Shana and me, on our way to an event for our current governor of New Jersey, Phil Murphy, 2017.

Karen and me on my speaking tour to try to understand conservatives, 2018.

Molly and me on safari in South Africa.

Chunk on his outbound flight to Spain.

Chunk at the end of our flight back to America.

Chunk testing out shoes that would keep him from flying down the stairwell.

Chunk loved the rain.

Tammy.

Bert, freshly shorn, and Bernice.

This is how Tammy would stiffen whenever I picked her up. She is freshly shorn in this pic because, like Bert, she had some lumps I needed to get a better look at.

The look Bert gives me when Mama leaves the house.

Me trying to pretend my dogs love me.