I keep looking at this picture—or rather, the pictures in this picture—and thinking, "Look at how young they are." By the time I met my stepfather's parents they were already old. In the years since, his father has continued getting older and his mother has passed away. But in that portrait they'll always be young.

Back when I was pretty fresh out of college and the world of Internet forums still felt new and fun to me, I had a woman insist to me that photographs steal your soul. It didn't occur to me until an embarrassing number of years later that she might have been pulling my leg a bit—I suppose this may have something to do with why so many people thought (think) that I didn't (don't) have a sense of humor. In any case, I answered her seriously.

"How can a photograph steal your soul?" I asked. "Especially a digital photograph. All it is is a bunch of ones and zeros that describe something about some light that bounced off of you." I just didn't get it. I was very earnest—I think she was probably smiling at me. (Not laughing, just smiling—she had (has) too much class and style to laugh at someone's naiveté.)

And yet, somehow, the longer I live and the more photographs I make, the more it starts to make sense. Because what's a soul if not the thing that makes you you? The million little pieces of yourself, the looks, the gestures, the angle at which he cocks his head when he asks a question, or the way her nose crinkles when she smiles. It's not stealing, exactly, because you can't steal something without diminishing the one from whom you steal it. But something gets caught, captured, made permanent by the camera.

I find myself looking at this picture and wondering what these two were like when they were that age. There's something in their eyes that hints at something, but I don't know what. All I can think about is how young they look. And then I wonder who will be saying the same thing about that picture of Jason. Who will be saying it about me? And will we be around to know? If we're lucky, some day someone will say it about all of us. Or, at least, about the bits of our souls hanging around in the corners of someone else's dining room.

Beeswax. It makes a great lip balm. It's also something you should mind—but only your own.

You have probably seen this week's "Are You Mom Enough?" cover of Time. At least, judging from my Facebook feed and the blog buzz about it you have. I have no doubt that the photographer, Martin Schoeller, and Time's cover editors were fully aware of how riled up that cover would get people. It is, after all, exactly the kind of thing about which people these days feel a need to opine. You know what, though? This is not something that falls into the category of "your beeswax."

"But! But!" I can hear the objection coming already. "Don't you think she's screwing up her kid by keeping him on the breast so long? My God, don't you think it's weird?"

Yes, of course I think it's weird. You know what else I think is weird? Something you do in your family. Yes, you—all of you. And of course I think she's screwing up her kid, not because she's extending breastfeeding or following attachment practices but because she's a parent. You are screwing up your kids too. So am I.

Look, every single one of us is going to get it wrong with our kids. The best we can hope to do is to minimize the damage we cause and give our kids the means to cope with the rest.

And aren't there enough real problems in the world without having to find new things to get upset about? On the scale of things for me to care about, this is somewhere between how other people make their hot dogs and whether or not they put sweaters on their pets. Are they doing something I wouldn't do? Sure. Does it affect me? No, not really.

So, sure, maybe I think it's weird if some family wants to breastfeed their kids until they're twelve. But odds are, their kids are going to be fine, and parenting is hard enough on a good day; the last thing most of us need is some nosy blowhard butting into our lives to tell us what we're doing wrong.

It does cut both ways, of course. That other family over there? The one that bottle fed from day one and Ferberized their kids? Those kids are going to be fine, too. Maybe that's not how you would raise your own children, but it's none of your business.

None of us are perfect. We're all doing the best we can. Let's all just take a deep breath and get back to minding our own beeswax.

Jason is walking over to pick up that big rock so he can throw it. Just so you know.

The jelly beans go in there.

"Daddy, daddy, look at this!"

"OK, what do you want me to see? Oh, OK. You're making... dirt angels. That's very nice. But I don't think Mommy would like you to be getting that dirty."

We keep telling him not to play in the blinds. I guess the message gets a little diluted when I stop to take a picture first, though.

Lately Jason has become a bit more camera shy. Though, trying to avoid being in a picture is sometimes a lot of fun for him.

I don't really know why photographers always seem to be drawn to taking pictures of themselves in mirrors, but apparently I'm no more immune to that tendency than anyone else.

I've somehow managed to average one movie a month since December, largely due to the fact that Jason is old enough to go to the theater now. That's way up from the past few years, but on the other hand, taking Jason with me means my choice of films has changed somewhat.

The Muppets: There aren't that many movies I get excited to see with Jason, but this was one of the few recent ones that fell into that category. I know that a number of purists—including Frank Oz—felt that too much license was taken with the characters, but for me this newest in a long line of Muppet movies hit all the right notes. The movie is overtly nostalgic, most of which would likely miss the younger audience members—especially those who are under the age of 4. But it worked perfectly on me, managing to both bring me back to my own childhood while still being clever enough to appeal to my current, "mature" self. And Jason liked it, too. (Viewed 12/27/2011.)

Alvin and the Chipmunks: Chipwrecked: Look, sometimes you just need something to do that will keep your kid occupied. This was not a good movie, but that came as no surprise, and though I wasn't thrilled to see it, it also wasn't nearly as bad as I thought it would be. It gave me an excuse to eat popcorn and candy with my son, so at least on one level it was successful. (Viewed 1/2/2012.)

Beauty and the Beast 3D: Just as with the recent 3D re-release of The Lion King, I think that this movie was poorly served by the addition of 3D and I wish they'd leave well enough alone. Because we have it on DVD, Jason has seen Beauty and the Beast at least 20 times, so when I saw that it was coming back to the big screen I knew there was no way we'd be missing it. The thing is, though, it didn't need the 3D—we would have seen it anyway. Without the glasses sucking up the light from the screen, we'd have been able to see all of the color and brightness we were supposed to see. But the theater chains have to have some way to make money, and jacking up the ticket prices for 3D movies is the flavor of the week. As to the movie itself, I'm becoming more and more uncomfortable with the "love" story the more I watch it and the closer I get to my daughter being able to understand movies, but at this point it's become such a fixture in Jason's film life that I'm kind of stuck with it. (Viewed 1/21/2012.)

The Hunger Games: When the buzz around this movie first started and Juliette asked me whether or not I wanted to see it, I gave the following reasons for why I did not:

1. I enjoyed the book and found it well-paced, full of action, and with a compelling central character, and I didn't see what the movie could possibly add to the experience.
2. Film as a medium is great at showing action and visual scenery, but it is bad at showing the internal state of its characters. So much of the book revolves around what Katniss is thinking and how she feels, and it's just not possible for a movie to do a good job of showing all of that, especially not in a couple of hours.
3. In order to fit into a reasonable amount of time, parts of the book would definitely have to be cut out, but the book was already lean enough that there was a strong risk of important nuance or characterization or plot being left out.

As we were walking out of the theater after the movie, she asked me what I thought, and I told her that everything I thought beforehand, I still thought. It turned out to be about as good an adaptation as could be hoped for, and several of the performances were pretty good—Jennifer Lawrence, of course, but I also quite liked Woody Harrelson and Stanley Tucci. At the end of the day, though, the movie just didn't bring anything new to the table—I really could have done without it. (Viewed 4/12/2012.)

The Pirates! Band of Misfits: I've been a fan of Aardman Animations since high school, when a friend of mine introduced me to Wallace and Gromit. I was really excited when Chicken Run came out. So the fact that I got to have a fun Daddy-Jason day at the movies at a time when this one was available was a real treat. I'm not sure I would put this latest title quite as high as some of the earlier favorites, but I found Pirates to be thoroughly enjoyable. A lot of the voice acting was top notch—Hugh Grant did a wonderful job, I thought, and I quite enjoyed Martin Freeman and Brendan Gleeson as well. I was also surprised and delighted to see that David Tennant provided the voice of Charles Darwin. Overall, a cute and fun movie that made for a fun afternoon out with my boy. (Viewed 4/28/2012.)

Don't worry, the snake is made of rubber. The only way it could hurt him is if he happened to hit himself in the face with it. Which he did, actually.