view from my desk
A couple of weeks ago, my son picked the book Waggit Forever to read. I read it out loud to him, usually three or four chapters at a time. He wanted me to read more, but my throat would wear out by then. One morning he woke me up with the book in his hand. “Mom! Please read!”
He was excited to find out the ending of the book, and then sad to realize that was it. Then we learned that Waggit Forever is the third of a series. So, of course, I got him the previous two books. We got through them in a few days. He shunned TV and the Wii for these books.
But now they’re done. Well, he figured he could write his own Waggit stories. We sat down and listed all the characters and took notes on possible story lines. My son decided four pages of notes would be a good start.
For a change of scene, I offered to take him to the coffee shop to work on it. I thought he would like the offer. He said yes. I thought he’d sit for an hour. He sat at a table in the coffee shop from about 12:50pm to 6:35pm. We wrote out pages of Waggit stories.
The next day, he said he’d have to make a map of the park Waggit and his friends lived in. He spent about 6 total hours to draw this map–three large pieces of drawing paper connected together. We cut tiny pieces of paper, each piece to represent a dog, and he moved them around, figuring out where they were going, and all the places were they had their adventures.
We emailed the author, Peter Howe, too. My son told him all his favorite scenes, asked if there would be a 4th book, and told him about the stories he was writing. And Peter Howe wrote back! He is writing another book and he thinks it is great my son is writing his own stories. He asked my son to share them when he was done.
Now, how’s that for a fan?
I’m amazed by my son’s commitment. Then I worry if I’ve doomed him to an obsession. Can you imagine inspiring someone to such a degree?
(Postscript: “Mom, Peter Howe wrote 258 pages. We’ve only written 40 something pages. We’ve got a lot more work to do!”)
