“You cannot write about us in your blog!” was the request that I was reminded from my family before I started doing this; writing a blog. This blog started out as being solely about the books I write, but a writer writes what she knows, and I know my family, so the two are destined to intertwine. And of course, they will, have, and do.
The characters in a book that a writer writes, somehow gets embedded in the head. They’re fair-weathered friends that travel and live as part of the family for a while. They eat, sleep, shower, buy groceries, put them up, let the dog out, let the dog back in, make the trip to buy gas, mow the lawn, work out at the gym, and go to church and restaurants because they’re there visiting, and therefore, they’re always around.
They slip out into conversation from time-to-time, but my family, (not accommodating might I add) demands that they go right back in the brain and stay there, in their dwelling place. I obey, putting them back that is, because the characters are not meant to pester, but their entertainers amidst the pages of the book. They have to come out with the author in order to live well, and develop. You (in general) can’t cage them up, or leave them on the computer because they won’t work to their full potential that way, in the writing. They can’t grow when not given sunlight, and allowed to live, and receive nourishment.
That is the point of my blog today; searching the meaning of the word naive in which “our family world” has come to graciously live it, and then actually be grateful for it. It’s a great word, and here is why…I’ll be fast.
When we began our home school journey, we knew it was the right way to go for one of our children, who was a twenty-four hour, seven-day-a-week, thinker. The world was going to get in his head, and that head was made to study and think, so schooling at home was a brilliant plan that we were glad to stumble across.
However, when it came time to make the decision for our other two children, we struggled, because the world gives an education within itself, and good or bad, your children have to be taught “it” at some point. Schooling at home was not world-friendly, and that’s what we needed at first; a somewhat secluded, safe-learning environment for one of our children, but then, we weren’t so sure! We began questioning ourselves.
We didn’t want our kids weird to put it bluntly. We wanted them to learn normal coping mechanisms within the world, because the world would slaughter a naive one, so we must not rear that type of child, goodness no. But in the end, a writer won our decision, as the God of the world probably used her to sway us, along with the teacher who my husband went to visit at conference time, one chilly October morning, at the largest high school in our city. The teacher didn’t know our kid, and our kid was one of the brightest in the school, or so we had many pieces of paper that told us that much.
No, that was not the case, as the teacher didn’t know our child, nor that the child was smart!
“Her grades are exceptionally good, she is an honor student, and she is a scholar. You still didn’t know she was in your class?” my husband inquired. The teacher answered, not embarrassed or apologetic, “No.”
Our child was a name on a piece of paper, a blank to the five-hour a week surrogate parent. Our child was only perceived as a number, so therefore the teacher didn’t know a thing about it. And that’s what she might as well have been, an it!
If our child was an it, then our child would have been remembered! But, as the story was at that time, our child was not remembered; translation, not cared about. So, home school was looking to win out, and then I found the article where the author brilliantly explained to a negative passer-by that her child didn’t put stock in designer clothes, betraying others, making the media the god of her existence, and the list went on of how schooling at home was the perfect answer because her child became a better person for society because of it! (I wish I still had that author’s work, because it was brilliant!)
We were sold! Good-bye public school, where our kid was just an unknown number on a piece of paper -not just by the one teacher, but my a few- and hello to a life that opened up so many accepting and life-friendly opportunities!
Our kids became known, popular, gorgeous beings, just like their other home-school friends! It was a method made in heaven, and to this day, we still celebrate our choice to walk the naive road; the one that so many of our neighbors and once-upon-a-time friends said we were “mental” for doing.
All of my books I promote in this blog reflect the life, the story, the drama of the not-so-sure parents that we were. We questioned what we were doing time and time again. But, once we reared the end product, we were pleasantly blessed, and thankful!
To be continued, as I’ll explore my naive title a little more again on another day. I write all my books with a naive character at the forefront, and how she learns about life. It’s a good thought, and needs to be examined. I know this It’s a beautiful thing to witness, when you’re children turn back to it, the innocence, once again! 🙂
*In a later blog, my son will write it, and give the other side. My daughters were raised differently, one naive and sheltered, “On That Day” is based on her, (only based, as I made most of it up) while the other we raised on a public school swim team with one foot in the world, and one in a sheltered homeschool environment. Our son, however, the one that started it all for us, he was very sheltered and has much resentment on the topic. He is respectful, but he said because of our choices, he was forced to suffer embarrassment many times in college. I myself will be interested to see what he writes in contrast to me. He still lives at home, goes to college, does a Bible study everyday, so we didn’t fail completely. He is a delight to our souls, but he does have an opinion, make no mistake. He’ll speak later. *
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