Okay, so I fell off the daily email wagon while I agonized over my memoir, but I’m back on it now.

RTR ended two weeks ago. I took loads of photos and planned tons of posts, and then — nada. I am sorry about that. But it’s okay, because the photos are still on my hard drive, just waiting for me to get my ass in gear and post them. Here are a few of the wonderful people I met:

Nelda and Jerry, tooling around camp on their Segways

Randy, the Mobile Kodger, reading one of his hilarious poems

Tara, who is deaf-mute, taught a delightful class in American Sign Language (ASL)

…and more to come.

Fair warning: I plan to write a short piece about my travels and thoughts every day from now on (with an occasional interview with a fellow vandweller). If you’re receiving my emails and that doesn’t appeal to you, you can unsubscribe at the link below. If you’re reading this on the blog and it DOES appeal, sign up here.

As for the memoir, for those of you who subscribed to receive Dispatches from La Vanne, including the chapters as I write them ($7/mo), the writing has slowed down a bit while I work on the basic structure of the book. (But never fear, Chapter 5 is coming soon!)

I had this idea that if I just started, things would sort themselves out — but of course, they didn’t. So I’m reading a fantastic book by Larry Brooks, the author of StoryFix.com, called STORY ENGINEERING: Mastering the 6 Core Competencies of Successful Writing. It’s about novel writing, but the wisdom in it applies to memoirs too. If you want people to read your story, fiction or not, it needs to be compelling. More than anything, I want DOTTY’S DINER, the story of growing up in my mother’s diner, to be as compelling to read as it was to live. So I am working hard at learning this maddening craft.

If you’re a writer, or want to be, I highly recommend STORY ENGINEERING. (Yes, that is an affiliate link. If you buy the book, I will receive a few cents some day.)

See you tomorrow!