NaNoWriMo

National Novel Writing Month, known as NaNoWriMo for short, is here: November! Obviously I am feeling like I need a bit of a push to get this novel finished, so I signed up to write a novel, 50,000 words, in the month of November. You are considered a "winner" if you make it to the word count, which frees up the creative mind to write complete garbage. You allow yourself to write a "shitty first draft" as Anne Lamott puts it succinctly in her book on writing, Bird by Bird. A highly recommended read for you writer types. If you have any books you'd like to suggest, please leave a comment.

Part of the tricky thing while writing is to get the editor side of your brain to shut off while the creative side is let lose on the page to scribble and meander and play. The editor is the part of your mind that worries about your writing being interesting, worries about spelling, and tells you that your ideas are completely boring and unoriginal and who would even want to read them anyway!? Who can write with such pressure?

So it's day four, and while I haven't finished my writing for the day, I have been getting at least 1,700 words in over the last three days. To get to the 50,000 I need to type at least 1,700 words each day, or double up if I miss a day. So far so good. Lots of ideas, lots to say, lots that is waiting to be found if I keep looking, like the layers of bark peeling back around the trunk of a trembling aspen. New layers are just waiting to be found, and if I run out of material I have the ten or so journals that I have been filling up with ideas for years at my disposal. Now is the time, and I am certainly seizing the days.