If you wait for inspiration, you’re not a writer, but a waiter.
(Anonymous)
(Anonymous)
I did it, yes, I did! 51,022 words according to the Office of Letters and Light, and 51,271 according to Scrivener. Quite the discrepancy, eh? Good thing there was a scene I simply had to finish…
One of the things I love about participating in the National Novel Writer’s Month is that there is no time to wait. I’ve got 30 days and 50,000 words to write, and waiting for inspiration doesn’t get any words typed on the page. I am lucky to have the house to myself while the rest of the family is gone – ten hours of blissful silence!
Of course I discovered that I seem to be most productive between the hours of 8 and 10PM…
Yeah… that’s not going to work. My family likes a little face time, and I want to be available to hear about the things that happened during their day, rather than making a mad attempt to nail down another two- or three-thousand words. I’ve tried coaxing that creative burst at the opposite end of the clock, but I end up spending an awful lot of time staring at the texture on the ceiling. On Day 22 I talked about the nearly-overwhelming desire to clean out the storage area. I did clean a little—but only for a little while. Neither my nose nor my back appreciated the dusty confines, and there was this novel I was supposed to be working on. Knowing my extracurricular project might take me a while, I kept everything under control: one stack of boxes (out of the way) to go to charity, and everything else within the… er… hole. However… the box that inspired the project was still tucked away in a corner of the kitchen. Hubby, tired of it being there for nearly a week, asked if we could put it away, and when I pointed out that I was in sporadic mid-clean, he volunteered to do the cleaning for me!
Woohoo!
Well… almost. He dragged everything out of the space and left it in the hallway, had to go to a family activity, and then got sick. He meant well.
I cleaned. It’s funny how much better my story looks when I am otherwise occupied.
So I actually crossed the 50K mark last night, wrote a little further, and decided to write even a little further this morning. “Little” was the key word. I ended up doing some online shopping and gave in to the impulse to play Bejeweled a few times. Tomorrow I will get back to the ‘real’ world. I hear there’s some ironing to do, some pants to patch, and I have another short story to introduce to the world. I want to catch up on articles on all my favorite writer blogs and read a few books—but most of all, I want to write!
Thank you, thank you to family and friends that put up with an entire month of literary abandon!
Congrats on the NaNo win, Robin! I made it too, calling it the Purple Bar Club just for fun. Hope it was an awesome experience for you. Enjoy a few days of relaxation and catch-up (took me five) you've earned it friend 🙂
I'm most productive between 8 and midnight, but then I sometimes have trouble sleeping because my mind's still going. I enjoyed your post.
@genelempp Thanks, Gene, I had a blast. I found you on the NaNoWriMo website! That was fun, too. Should have thought to look earlier. With all the cool info you dig up for your Designing From Bones series, I'll bet you have a terrific setting and story!
@Janalyn Voigt I can sympathize with the busy brain syndrome. I have trouble sleeping too. The hard thing is convincing myself to just get out of bed and go write or read, especially in Winter when the bed is so cozy and warm…