Busy Christmas

Routines get upended during the holidays. My eight-month-old nephew, who is so sweet, has had his routines disrupted this last week by the Christmas festivities, as well as by his visiting and overly-excited uncles. He gets cranky. He refuses to go down for a nap. I’ve been privately saying to him, “I’m with you, mister!” Holidays with family have been wonderful, full of traditions and (especially with this being my nephew’s first holiday season) new joys, but in this last stage of our visit to the US, I am looking forward to a bit of a return to the routine, a bit of quiet time.

*The photographs in this post come from a couple of hikes I have taken with my dad here in Stevens Point, Wisconsin. I miss these midwestern forests.*

*We caught the sun before it went down.*

We have been having really good family time, first in Montana, then in Wisconsin. We took a couple of days to drive over to Minneapolis to visit friends. I am writing this post on the last day of 2022, although it won’t post until the first day of the new year, tomorrow. It’s a time of transition, renewal, growth, reflection, change, and reminiscence. I feel fortunate to get to spend time with the people I love, to have these disruptions to my routines for the best kinds of reasons. At the end of the old year and the beginning of the new, there is a lot to be thankful for.

*This stand of birch trees leaned out over the frozen lake, catching the light.*

I mentioned in my post two weeks ago that I had good news. After a long time and many rejections, I’ve got a short story that is going to be published with Electric Literature‘s The Commuter on Monday morning, January 2. It means a lot to have this piece get out there. I hope the story is meaningful to someone out there. I get more rejection letters than I care to count, but I understand that that is part of this process, and every so often something like this comes through. I feel fortunate and grateful.

… Update, January 2, 2023: here is the story:

A trip to the beach causes a reckoning with time in “Mom on the Beach" by Jimmy Kindree (@JimmyKindree). https://t.co/aHms7b36IL
— Electric Literature (@ElectricLit) January 2, 2023

*Electric lines stretching into the distance.*

We have a few days yet before we begin the journey back to Norway. I hope I can get back into a little writing routine. I’m working on a couple of short stories, and I’m doing some reading for a friend in my writing group. The new term at school is on the horizon also, and I have preparations to do for that. Time doesn’t stop, often as I wish it could. For now, I’m about to go spend some good New Year’s Eve time with my family.