Monthly Archives: November 2011

NaNoWriMo: The Last Three Days

Posted in All Posts, Blogging, Books, Words, Writing by

NaNoWriMo ends in three short days.  I can’t believe how fast it’s gone.  Of course, November is a busy month.  I’ve said it before and I’ll say it again.  November is the second worst month to have NaNoWriMo. (December is the worst.)  There is, of course, the satisfying feeling of accomplishment at the end of the year.  If you win, that is.  If you don’t, well, you’ve got your first New Year’s Resolution.

I’ve got enough New Year’s Resolutions to break.  As of today, I have 47,796/50,000 words.  According to my nifty stats page over at NaNos site, I have to write 551 words a day to finish on time.  That’s not really my style.  I write huge chunks at a time.  Ideally, I’d be doing that now, instead of writing on the blog, but you know how that goes.  I’ll probably wait until November 30 and validate my novel at 11:59 PM.  I like the drama.

I say I’m going to validate my novel.  That’s not exactly accurate.  I’ll validate a healthy portion of a novel.  It won’t be finished.  In fact, most of what I validate probably won’t be in the finished novel.  This is some meandering, indulgent stuff, people.  I’m doing what Stephen King calls, “Writing with the door closed.”  (From his book, On Writing, which is excellent.  Read it.  It’ll change your whole perspective on writing.  Good stuff.)  The next few months (or longer) will be editing and rewriting, all with the door wide open.  Open to people who aren’t me, reading what I wrote.  That changes things.   And for the better.

In the meantime, I am willing to show a portion of what I wrote.  Some people think they want to read that.  Well, here it is.  My actual words from my actual novel, in no particular order.

 

 

 

 

About these ads

NaNoWriMo Dropout

Posted in All Posts, Blogging, Kids, Life, Motherhood, Writing by

NaNoWriMo is exciting.  In the days and weeks leading up to the craziness, the blogosphere is full of “Should I?,”  ”I’m doing it,” and “NaNoWriMo Is Stupid/Bad Writing/Not How It’s Done” posts.  Twitter is all, well, atwitter, with the same thing.  Then, November 1 hits.

Now it’s posts about word counts and plot lines.  Writers, not realizing how pretentious and crazy they sound, complaining their characters aren’t doing what they’re told and talking about the lessons they’re learning about themselves as writers.  I wrote one of those myself. (See here.)  Participants blather on to anyone who’ll listen.  When they run out of real people, they take to the Twitter, where anyone who blindly and innocently clicked their “follow” button is subjected to annoying word count updates and complaints about not sleeping.

You can get riveting tweets like this from me by clicking the Twitter button in the sidebar. I'm sure my follower numbers will soar after this post.

After the second week, these posts and tweets start disappearing.  WriMo’s are dropping like flies.  Some choose to simply fade into the background, hoping no one will notice they flaked.  The smart ones write “NaNoWriMo Dropout” posts.  These posts are filled with the deep philosophical reasons that NaNo wasn’t for them, which all boils down to one argument, basically.

“Quantity over quality doesn’t work for me.  I care too much about my writing/characters to rush through it.”

It’s a valid argument and sure to find support from anyone who’s ever attempted to write a novel.  Like I said, they’re smart.  Me?  Not so much.

If Dropping Out was an Olympic Sport, I’d have about 20 gold medals.  You name it, I’ve dropped out of it.  Piano lessons, cheerleading, college, the gym,  watercolor painting,  Atkins/South Beach/Weight Watchers Points Plan/Low Carb/Low Fat/Low Calorie or any other fad diet you can think of.  My justification of choice is my five children.  Nobody argues with that reason.  But I know the truth.

I am lazy.  Nicer people (you know who you are) call me “laid back.”  Psht.  Let’s drop the niceties.   I am LA-ZY.  In keeping with this truth, I should have dropped out of NaNoWriMo a long time ago.

There have been several days this month when dropping out seemed like the right thing to do.  I was behind on my word count.  My story was lagging.  I was too tired.  I wrote through it, and it shows.  Some serious crap flows from fatigued fingers, let me tell you.  But I want to finish this.  I’m sick to death of dropping out of things that are important to me because I don’t want to put in the work.  What is that teaching my dear children, my scapegoats?

“Mommy could have done something, if it hadn’t been for you.”

And there it is.  The reason I’m not writing a NaNoWriMo Dropout post.  Because this mama has something to prove.  To herself.  Her children.  And anyone who says, “You can’t…”