Summer has officially begun: the season of travel and concerts. Yesterday morning, we returned from a three-day weekend in Alaska, last night I went to the first outdoor concert of the season, Arcade Fire at the Greek Theater, and tonight, I leave for New York and then Massachusetts for my tenth reunion.

Our weekend in Alaska was great. These short visists are always an emotional time, spending time with family and remembering what it was like to grow up in Anchorage, in that house, in that room… I think about all of the things I used to do that I don’t really do anymore, like spending long, lazy afternoons outside, or staying up late building model airplanes or listening to music or reading Tintins. Now, some of those things I don’t do because I’m not a kid anymore, but there are other things that are just suited to an Alaskan existence that don’t work elsewhere. It’s just nice to go back every once in awhile.

During my last visit, I cleaned out two boxes from the stacks of stuff labeled “Brian” in the basement. This time, I got rid of two more plus I consolidated four boxes into one, so I guess I got rid of five more boxes worth of stuff. Aimee was ready to just dump it all into the recycling bin, but I had to go through it and sort of say goodbye to all of the newspaper clippings, catalogs, brochures, and other assorted ephemera I had collected over the years.

As I looked through the boxes, filled with folders with neatly typed labels, I found files on airshow disasters, articles about the attack on Libya, multiple files of clippings about every single game in the Broncos’ 1987 season, applications for Space Camp (never filled out), certificates for Junior Honor Society and summer cooking class, writing assignments for my 12th grade English class, articles on escapes from East Germany, nine mini-golf scorecards from three days spent in Vail one summer, maps and hotel stationery from every trip we took in the mid- to late-80s, and old computer catalogs from Epyx, Brøderbund, and Apple. There was a lot more stuff that pretty summarily went into the trash, like entire notebooks from high school full of notes and exams on things I couldn’t begin to understand or explain today. The English papers were nice to look at again, and I saved the 5 x 7 card Mrs. Morris let us fill with as much information as we possibly could to take into our final exam; my tiny handwriting came in handy on that one.

On Saturday night, I enjoyed a Valley Trash Ale along with our nice dinner at The Bridge, where we hadn’t been before.



My dad and I put up about a dozen photos on the wall of his office, and Aimee and I helped my mom pot some plants for the front porch. On Sunday, we headed up to Palmer to visit the Musk Ox Farm, and I snapped photos of ten new coffee shacks to add to the list. On the way home, the rear window of my mom’s car spontaneously shattered with a loud bang, and we covered the hole with plastic and duct tape, giving the car a nice Alaskan look.

And of course, a visit wouldn’t be complete without a trip to the newly-expanded Moose’s Tooth; we went the last time I was in town in March, but Aimee hadn’t experienced it yet, and it’s never too often for a pesto supreme pizza and some craft beer.

I got in two good runs along the coastal trail, one with a moose sighting and one without, and we generally just hung out at home and helped out with what we could. It was nice to be home again, and the long days were really enjoyable. I’m ready for a busy summer.