November marks the start of National Novel Writing Month (NaNoWriMo), a challenge in which participants attempt to write a 50,000 word story in 30 days. This is my attempt at completing it for the third consecutive year. I’ve kept with the tradition of the past two years by purchasing my official tee shirt saying I won, which will serve as an incentive while I work toward a daily word count of 1,667 (rounding up to avoid an evil number).
Fortunately, in the past I have gone over my count on some days, while others prove more challenging, with appointments and events scattered through the month to interfere with typing time (not the least of which is Thanksgiving). As part of my self-care daily routine, I normally solve a variety of daily online puzzles. My landscaping requires sporadic watering until the first year is over (or in cases of rain or snow), and the leaves have waited until the end of October to demand my attention. I have also committed to a gettogether with some old friends on one weekend, and a second annual trip across state on another. This means I will be writing at some odd hours, at least for me. Some folks are staying up on Halloween until midnight to get an official jumpstart to the challenge, but that won’t be me.
Meanwhile, my mind has been swimming with ideas waiting to be typed out, but I want those words to be part of my daily count, so instead of writing on my “when I think it, I write it” schedule, I’m suffering from an overstuffed brain until November 1.
I could liken the feeling of unrequited word counts to a full clothes dryer lint trap stuffed with fire-hazard fluff which also prevents a thorough dryer heating experience. However, I clean mine after every load without fail. When a repair person had to come out to replace a drum belt on the dryer, he even commented on how clean my lint trap was.
I can go to the great beyond knowing I had the cleanest and safest lint trap in the county.
Instead I should compare the excess brain stuff to the clutter that I dealt with for a week before trash collection. If you recall, I missed trash day the previous week, so everything I planned to put out had to wait to be discarded a week later. My weekly trash is usually one bucket, one box and one bag, but this week it was no bucket, three boxes and two bags. What will the neighbors think?
So I have been going through my days while living with the ideas for the start of my NaNoWriMo word count plucking at my brain; trying to mollify a complaining customer on my workplace computer while my protagonist has found a perfect reply to a secondary character’s question, and measuring cookie ingredients while the antagonist puts the heroine on the defensive. It’s a precarious load to balance.
You may say that the solution is to handwrite it down somewhere. My problem as a writer is that my brain breaks the sound barrier on the Autobahn, while my hands write at the pace of a crippled snail. I would like to journal, but the end result would be like the Rosetta Stone; it would take ages to decipher. Even I can’t read some of what I’ve attempted to write down without intense concentration. My dreams will forever be lost to unreadable scribble.
Once November rolls around, though, there will be no stopping me. My intention is to write enough to have the groundwork for three of my four stories drafted (book one is in the editing phase now).
I can then spend December recovering. And doing more laundry.
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