And Now For Something Completely Different
It's November, and for many writers, that means something completely different than what it means for the rest of the population.
When most people think November, they think Thanksgiving.
Unless they are crazily dedicated shoppers, when they might think of Black Friday. (I have NEVER done a Black Friday foray! Have you?) 
But for me, like many writers, November means NaNoWriMo. 
NaNoWriMo is short for National Novel Writing Month. Every November, a huge number of writers from around the world try to write a novel in one month. They begin on November 1 (the most dedicated at midnight. Me? I didn't start until 8 in the morning.). In order to win, each has to have 50,000 words written by the time December 1 comes around. What does one win? Bragging rights. Nothing more.
I've competed in NaNo many times in the past, sometimes on the regular NaNo site and sometimes as a teacher/mentor in their Young Writers Program. I don't think I've ever actually won. Most years I finish in the mid 30,000 range. Each year, including this year, I think will be different.
Whether or not I win this year, it WILL be completely different, because I'm writing about a time period that is very different than anything else I've done in the past. I'm writing about Folsom man in New Mexico.
Folsom man wandered New Mexico 10,000 years ago, a little after the last Ice Age. By the time he got here, the mammoths and a lot of the other megafauna were gone. The first evidence of his (and I use man and him in the more general sense of people of both genders) being here were bison antiquus bones and spearpoints found near Folsom, New Mexico a little over a hundred years ago.
I started thinking about Folsom man in New Mexico years ago, when I first started teaching New Mexico history. I knew nothing about ancient New Mexico. Heck, I didn't know that much about recent New Mexico history. But Patrice Lewis, an experienced and excellent teacher, took me under her wing. She taught me a lot of history - and she taught me a lot about teaching as well. Patrice and I went to Wild Horse Arroyo, the site near Folsom where the bones had been found. The site is on private land and is inaccessible to the public except during biannual guided tours led by state archaeologists.
The road to Wild Horse Arroyo was little more than a trampled-down path through pasture. Once we arrived, there wasn't much to see; if there were any bones left at the site, they were buried.
But the tour guide was also a great story teller. We stood around by the side of his truck as he explained not only what had been found at this particular location, and the circumstances that led to the discovery, but what the people who had lived here thousands of years ago had been like.
By the time we were driving back to Albuquerque, ideas were swirling around in my mind. Those ideas have been swirling for nearly a decade now. I've done a lot of reading and a lot of research, and now I'm writing the story of one of the boys who had been there, that late fall day long, long ago. Of course, I can't actually know him, but I have studied and I can imagine.
Jennifer Bohnhoff is a retired middle school English and Social Studies teacher who lives in the mountains of central New Mexico. Her most recent book, A Blaze of Poppies, was published in October 2021 and is a novel set in New Mexico and France during the First World War. Her next book, When Duty Calls, is a novel about the Civil War in New Mexico, and is written for middle grade readers. The one she is currently writing, tentatively titled The Bison Hunters, needs a lot more work before she can even consider publishing it.
When most people think November, they think Thanksgiving.
Unless they are crazily dedicated shoppers, when they might think of Black Friday. (I have NEVER done a Black Friday foray! Have you?) But for me, like many writers, November means NaNoWriMo. NaNoWriMo is short for National Novel Writing Month. Every November, a huge number of writers from around the world try to write a novel in one month. They begin on November 1 (the most dedicated at midnight. Me? I didn't start until 8 in the morning.). In order to win, each has to have 50,000 words written by the time December 1 comes around. What does one win? Bragging rights. Nothing more.I've competed in NaNo many times in the past, sometimes on the regular NaNo site and sometimes as a teacher/mentor in their Young Writers Program. I don't think I've ever actually won. Most years I finish in the mid 30,000 range. Each year, including this year, I think will be different.
Whether or not I win this year, it WILL be completely different, because I'm writing about a time period that is very different than anything else I've done in the past. I'm writing about Folsom man in New Mexico.
Folsom man wandered New Mexico 10,000 years ago, a little after the last Ice Age. By the time he got here, the mammoths and a lot of the other megafauna were gone. The first evidence of his (and I use man and him in the more general sense of people of both genders) being here were bison antiquus bones and spearpoints found near Folsom, New Mexico a little over a hundred years ago. I started thinking about Folsom man in New Mexico years ago, when I first started teaching New Mexico history. I knew nothing about ancient New Mexico. Heck, I didn't know that much about recent New Mexico history. But Patrice Lewis, an experienced and excellent teacher, took me under her wing. She taught me a lot of history - and she taught me a lot about teaching as well. Patrice and I went to Wild Horse Arroyo, the site near Folsom where the bones had been found. The site is on private land and is inaccessible to the public except during biannual guided tours led by state archaeologists.
The road to Wild Horse Arroyo was little more than a trampled-down path through pasture. Once we arrived, there wasn't much to see; if there were any bones left at the site, they were buried. But the tour guide was also a great story teller. We stood around by the side of his truck as he explained not only what had been found at this particular location, and the circumstances that led to the discovery, but what the people who had lived here thousands of years ago had been like.
By the time we were driving back to Albuquerque, ideas were swirling around in my mind. Those ideas have been swirling for nearly a decade now. I've done a lot of reading and a lot of research, and now I'm writing the story of one of the boys who had been there, that late fall day long, long ago. Of course, I can't actually know him, but I have studied and I can imagine.
Jennifer Bohnhoff is a retired middle school English and Social Studies teacher who lives in the mountains of central New Mexico. Her most recent book, A Blaze of Poppies, was published in October 2021 and is a novel set in New Mexico and France during the First World War. Her next book, When Duty Calls, is a novel about the Civil War in New Mexico, and is written for middle grade readers. The one she is currently writing, tentatively titled The Bison Hunters, needs a lot more work before she can even consider publishing it.
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