Snapshots from Eldredge

The life and writings of TJ Alexian

Tag Archives: summer


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Planting seeds

Corb and I spent the afternoon working on the yard. So much to do after the long winter…beds to rake through, trees to prune, transformations to undergo. We…or should I say Corb?…have a lot of plans to transform the backyard from “drab to fab”!

On a similar note, the other big thing I did this week-end was to continue edits on Late Night Show. I’m at chapter 21 and have about 120 pages left to go. In a similar way, I think editing this book has been like transforming the yard. Visualizing the world around me, attacking those verb tenses, digging up stale images and planting in their place new, interesting ways to bring the story to life.

Hopefully the book, like the back yard, will go from “drab to fab” by summer. Only in this case, I can’t rely on Corb’s creative brilliance to win the day…this landscape is something that’s entirely of my own creation. And doing it I am! Kami’s sick little world is coming to life before my eyes.


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Wish you were here

A week vacation? How nice, don’t mind if I do.

It’s been a strange week, though. Now that the kids are growing older and we have this big old place called Green Victoria. Used to be that we didn’t have enough room for anything, so we’d have to pack up our bags and actually go somewhere. Plus, we wanted to go somewhere…anywhere…we were so sick and tired of the same four walls containing us.

This year is different. I am still trying to get used it.

Theo, for one thing, has been practically non-existent. He’s too busy hanging out with his friends and working. He’s gone on exactly one day trip with us this week, to Canobie Lake. And even then? He brought a girl with him. A GIRL, of all things! And they spent the entire time walking around and doing rides on their own. We ate supper with them. That was it.

Annie’s been to more things than Theo, in some ways, even with a new job and a two year old. Or at least, she’s been more physically present. But of course, that’s different, too. Her focus is on a two year old that is just waking up to the world and what it has to offer, and is keeping busy getting into this and that and this.

Ashes is of course there. She likes being with us, but also, I think she wants to cling to being a kid for as long as she can. And of course, that’s not good. One of the biggest things I am grappling with this year is trying to find the right ways to properly equip her for what it means to be an adult and be responsible and be on her own. I haven’t entirely been successful. It concerns me a great deal. It frustrates Corb to no end. And I think it’s bewildering for her, too: there’s the world, it’s spinning so fast. How do I hang on for the ride?

And speaking of rides, this week has gone by far too fast. Can’t someone slow it down just a little please? I am not ready for it being even close to Monday yet. I need one more week before that happens.