Another November is almost over, and I’ll be the first to admit that I still need to get out of the design stage. So this is where I am at; I am currently developing a series of books for second-grade and third-grader readers based on a homeschool family much like my own only this family lives in an RV and travels around the US. The family is loosely based on my own family, who grew up homeschooling in the 1980s and 1990s and lived in a converted school bus that they converted to an RV. I have spent most of the month developing this idea and playing around with having my fictional family life during the 1980s and 90s rather than now. While now is fun for homeschooling and a lot easier than in the 80s and 90s, there is something I greatly miss about that time—the lack of technology. We didn’t have our first computer until around 1996, and then we had to share it with the whole family. No one had a cell phone, although my oldest brother had a pager; we all thought it was the coolest thing ever.
I remember running around the neighborhood when we lived in Denver and then running the dirt roads when we relocated to the Missouri Ozarks. We used to walk down the dirt road to the river and fish, swim, or hang out. Growing up in the 90s meant no cell phone, video games, internet, or social media. It was a great childhood that I wish my kids could experience. Instead, I have to pull my fifteen-year-old off the phone to get him back to his studies and remind him that playing Minecraft isn’t as educational as some think. Oh, how I long for those days. Ironically, my husband, born in the late 70s and grew up in the 80s and 90s, would tell me that he had all the video games and gaming consoles his heart desired, so I know they existed back then. It wasn’t as rampant as it is now, or maybe I was blessed not to have them in my home. So anyway, as I work on developing this series, I am leaning toward a family who not only RVs but chooses less technology instead of more. I hope my young readers connect with these fictional children and see the excitement and joy I experienced growing up without technology.
I am also playing around with some novels for adult readers. Three or four ideas are currently developing, so the NANOWRIMO has turned into a development month rather than a writing month. What about you? Are you outlining a new story, or are you on track to write 50,000 words this month? No matter where you are, I hope you enjoy the process.
