(2 of 2)
Each Hef volume has a title and a cover photo. He decided to call one of the volumes he was finishing on our day together "Holly Has a Daughter," since there were a lot of articles in it about how his ex-girlfriend Holly Madison had a daughter. "Will your wife mind that you're making a scrapbook about your ex?" I asked him. Hef looked at me, confused, and then told me he wasn't worried. Still, I decided that for my book I would hide the pictures of me with ex-girlfriends behind photos of me with my lovely wife Cassandra and call the volume "Joel Is Still Married."
I asked Hef if, during his weekly reflection, he ever got insights into the possibility of changing parts of his life. "That thought hasn't crossed my mind," he said. "What has crossed my mind is I'm the luckiest f---er in the world." Which, I guess, is just another way of saying cherish and reflect.
In fact, Hef insists he rarely opens old volumes, which Rubin says is typical of scrapbookers. "I probably don't go through my scrapbooks that much," she said. I nodded, pretending I don't go back and read my old columns all the time.
After Hef finished his volumes, he reviewed mine. It was the first scrapbook other than his own he'd ever seen. He was not impressed. He wanted me to put everything in chronological order and add captions. "When you do it this way, you'll be telling a story," he said. He also suggested I live a better story. "There was a moment in time--when I started the scrapbook--I reinvented myself," he said. "I changed my clothing, called myself Hef." The first trick to living a more interesting life, I was learning, was to give myself a scrapbooking name. I'm going with Stei. My second scrapbook is going to be much better. Mostly because I have some photos of Stei at the mansion.