Winding down from #NaNoWriMo, or 30 days of hell

NaNoWriMo is nearly over.

Hooray if you’ve already won or are soooo close you can taste it! If you are only at 30,000 words right now Ohmygodhurryyouarealmostoutoftimebutyoucandoit! If you are at 10,000, um, well, can't sneeze at 10K, it’s a good start and you are now 10,000 words closer to the end of your novel!

It’s not for everyone, this panic-filled mad rush to 50K. Would you do it again?

I’m unsure at this point. I cracked the magical 50K finish line a little bit ahead of schedule. Hey, who threw that?! I didn’t say it was GOOD. 

There. That's the crux of my issue with NaNoWriMo. What I wrote wasn't good. I don’t think I am especially OCD about my writing - a little, maybe - but I want what I write to be great. Isn't that the point? 

I started out with a general outline. I knew how the story would end, had prepared some scene ideas and character back stories all before November 1^st.  In case it's not clear, I am a planner, NOT a pantser, a seat of her pants writer.

At around 20,000 I started fizzling out but found my groove by shocking myself and pantsing it all over the effing place (and that sounds way dirtier than it should), ending up with some decent scenes including a biker gang fight that came out of NOWHERE. Then I threw her in jail at 33K. By 39K the fizzle beat the crap out of sizzle. Coffee, junk food, more coffee, lots of staring at the computer screen, lots of dramatic sighs and face palming.

Maybe it happened earlier or later for others. I tried checking #NaNoWriMo and #amwriting for ideas, did a couple word sprints but the sizzle, the fire, the drive, was gone. I got it back at around 45,000 after writing some pretty shitty words (I'm being kind here) by coming up with a better motivating back-story for my main character. But still, those shitty words taunted me, “fix me, I’m terrible” they say. "You're gonna leave me hanging like this all flat and awful?  There's a typo RIGHT NEXT TO ME."

I pushed on. I’m so glad I did. The first half is way better than the second half where my goal became word count not story, meeting the deadline instead of fleshing out the characters. The crazy deadline that is NaNoWriMo leaves no time to select the perfect word or come up with the perfect sentence. You have to put down good-enough-for-now words and eh-f*ck-it-I'll-change-it-later sentences and I found that surprisingly difficult.

 

BUT, here's the important part, hence the caps, NaNo taught me to follow the characters as they flipped me the bird and marched right off my outline and that the story is (mostly) better for it. Words can be changed, sentences and paragraphs can be improved later.

Today, as I write this, the sky is a canvas of gorgeous deep orange and pink. I hadn’t noticed sunsets all month because…Nano (also November which is typically very gray here in the Midwest). The very day I cracked that magical threshold at 50,716, the heavy pressure eased. Is my novel finished? HAHAHAHAHA. 

No. 

But the bones of a pretty good story are there, in JUST 30 DAYS. So maybe, possibly, next November I will go through this again. Until then, I’ll be revising, rewriting, and occasionally watching a beautiful sunset.

WRITE ON.

BOOM - First week in the can #NaNoWriMo

11/8/14

Holy crap, the first week of NaNo is in the can.

And I’m still writing.

I'm so not a write-by-the-seat-of-my-pants kind of gal. I WANT to be a pantser but I'm not. I planned, I researched, I outlined, I read, I attended the prep sessions in my region.

By the 30^th after changing the idea THREE times I was ready to write a 50,000 word novel in 30 days. HAHAHAHAHAHAHA

No. That's a big, fat lie. I was scared, giddy, WTF-ing all over the place. But determined.

As a first-timer taking on this challenge it find it has freed me. As I said I’m not a pantser. Honestly, I can't see how this ridiculous deadline can be done by true-blue pantsers but I’ve read that it’s been done. *Cough* bullshit *cough*

I’ve got ideas on where I’m headed, I know how my story should end, but how I get there is surprising me. That’s sort of pantsing, right?

The act of creating the story where ANYTHING can happen has been joyous. For Pete’s sake I massacred a bunch of people in a ballroom and KILLED THE MAYOR OF CHICAGO! (jk, I love ya, Rahm, you mad, bro?)

It’s fiction.

BOOM! That’s the power of Nano. I get it now.

Did you write your MC into a literal corner and are now spending hours staring at the computer trying to figure it out? BOOM have the floor open up or the building explode or the MC flying through the window.

You can't figure out what your MC would do next? BOOM have him/her do the least expected thing possible. MC is honest, upright citizen? Suddenly he runs down grandma in the street. You get the picture.

NaNoWriMo has freed my inner monster (in a good way, mostly, I think)

I’m at just under 20,000 words as of last night.  To be honest I thought I’d be biting my nails, racking my brain, swearing, maybe even crying when I’m stuck after the first week. I'm sure that will happen but then I get to tell myself BOOM anything can happen.

I’m not sure what’s coming up the pike to bite my characters in the ass in Week Two but I’ll figure it out.

BOOM giant lake monster actually bites my character in the ass. Hmmm.

WRITE ON.

#NANO FIRST-TIMER

November  1^st - IT’S NANO TIME

Before I get into opining on #NANOWRIMO I should point out that for a long time I was a medical transcriptionist, working out of my house. Yeah, it was awesome.  In medical transcription we use lots of short hand in Word, like sob automatically spits out shortness of breath, MI is myocardial infarction, tpi is The patient is. You get the idea. 

It strikes me today, writing the headline, that nov is nausea or vomiting. Yeah, funny right? Because November 1^st, the start of NaNoWriMo, probably elicits some that nov in participants, especially first-timers like myself.

I changed my story idea three times.  THREE! First it was a YA Urban Fantasy.  I had character back stories, scene ideas, plot ideas, research. Then I switched to a contemporary YA about a troubled teen who tries to solve her mother’s murder. More character back stories, scene ideas, plots, not so much research.

Then some of the panic and nausea (sans vomiting, thank goodness) set in;

1 - I’ve never written YA. What am I thinking?

2 - I’ve never written first person POV. What the hell am I thinking?

3 - I’ve never written a novel in 30 days. WTF am I thinking?!?

A day after that I switched back to Urban Fantasy and made it an adult,  tightened the plot, adultified (all right, I made that word up but it FITS, doesn't it?)the characters, etc. And that’s the novel I’m sticking to, swear. Thankfully, I can use the research already done for Idea #1.

So for me, chucking one-third of my panic and nausea – the YA part – calmed me enough to trick myself into thinking maybe okay possibly I could do this. Could I squeeze any more qualifiers in that sentence? I think not.

What also helps in the support of my Twitter buds encouraging me, my new friends on the regional Nano website competing on word counts, the funny writers at @Nanowrimo making me laugh, and the support of my friends and family.

THANK YOU!!!!!

*batman voice* (Bale, not West – I mean, come on, people, Bale clearly has the best batman voice of all the Batmans)  “Day one. Done.”

My word count currently sits at 3602, so I've met my 2000 word goal and then some. I’m going back tonight to wring out some more words.

Now that it’s begun I’m excited but not nauseated. Nervous but not vomiting (again, thank goodness because…gross).  Day one is nearly over and I’m feeling pretty confident.

I’ve read the blogs, attended the local prep sessions at the library, learned a lot.  I plan on attending a write-in tomorrow with some of the people from my local Nano group (they’re a fun group, many who have participated in Nano for years, some wins, some incompletes, a portion of us are first-timers)  Everyone’s warned me about the week two drag and I’m ready for that, too, by banking some words in week one.

I’m ready.

*batman voice* “Bring it, Nano. Day Two.”

*chugs Pepto*

WRITE ON.

How writing a novel healed my heart

Steve’s been gone for almost three and a half years now.

The thought comes out of the blue, in the middle of revising a scene in my manuscript. I've had other losses since Steve; my aunt in February, my mother in March after years of watching her suffer.  It hurt to lose her but knowing her pain was gone made it easier, sort of.

Steve's death, though, still has the power to sneak up on me, knock me flat, and leave me breathless. His was unexpected, sudden, violent, and chosen by him. Suicide of a loved one may end that person's suffering but it just begins the pain for everyone else.

It’s been a busy month. My novel has to be ready for critique in the next week or so (clutches stomach) AND

I have two short stories to submit by the end of the month AND

I am participating in my first NaNoWriMo.  That starts 11/1 leaving me only ten days of prepping, outlining, reading more first-person POV books, because sure, why not try something I’ve never done under a nearly impossible deadline. 50,000 words in 30 days?!? Aaaaah!

I don't have time for this! Does it come back because his birthday is, or would have been, next week? I lean forward and play the saved messages on my answering machine and realize I haven’t played them in months. The horror of that day slaps me again but his cigarette-rough voice saying "I love you" reminds of better times.

Suddenly I miss him so much.  He was angry, funny, kind, thoughtful, thoughtless, a bully, an asshole, a loyal friend and partner.  All those things, and more, all at once. He drank too much, smoked too much, used too many drugs. He hung a plaque in the office quoting a friend that said, “There will be mixed feelings.” They had been talking about when he dies. He did have a wickedly twisted sense of humor. You either loved him or hated him. I loved him. Lots of people loved him. It didn't matter.

My eyes burn but I don’t cry. I can let the darkness swallow me up or not. It’s my choice. 

Wait, what now? It's my choice? When did that happen? It wasn’t always my choice but it is today and that's AMAZING to me. EPIPHANY-LEVEL AMAZING. I say to him in my mind “Dude, I don’t have time for this today. I’m EFFING BUSY.” He throws up the W he was so fond of because it always annoyed the shit out of me. “Whatever.”

Put the phone down, people. I know it's just my imagination. 

Steve nagged and pushed me to pursue writing. If he'd stuck around he’d be so proud that I completed a novel set at the farm that he, and I, loved so much. And maybe annoyed that it took me so long. He’s not in the book (and he’d be pissed about that. Why that makes me smile and say HA-HA in the voice of Nelson, the bully from the Simpsons, I don’t know).

Today I realize I'm happy - the pride is mine. I accomplished this wonderful thing with the support of my family and friends. I accomplished this despite Steve's absence. Writing this book, finishing it, and now revising it has healed me without me knowing it.

Yeah, I wrote a freaking book. Maybe it sucks balls, maybe it doesn't. Time will tell, I guess, when I'm ready to unleash it on the world. I wanted the readers to smile and laugh with my characters, worry with them during their adventures, breathe a sigh of relief at the Happy Ever After.

And clamor for the sequel, of course. Duh.

I guess my point is this - bad stuff happens.  Awful, dark, soul-draining, heart-wrenching things. We, the survivors, plod on, head down, one foot in front of the other until one day we realize we are skipping again.  Those awful, dark, soul-draining, heart-wrenching things are still with us; we just find the strength to carry them instead of dragging it behind us.

So I am taking this hour to be sad on a drizzly gray October day. I’ll write that dark story inside me someday but not today. I have a scene to finish revising and a short story to block...

WRITE ON

A football girl's dilemma

A FOOTBALL GIRL’S DILEMMA

Hooray!! BEARS WIN!  BEARS WIN!

I am a football girl (a long-time, long-suffering but ever hopeful diehard Bears fan) who cheered last night’s win over the Jets on Monday Night Football. GO BEARS!  

I am also a woman, a feminist even, horrified and disgusted by the Ray Rice video and the subsequent alleged cover up by the Ravens organization.  Rice isn’t the only batterer, of course.  He is just more famous because he played in the NFL. Perhaps only boxer Floyd Mayweather is more notorious now for his female-punching ways.

Yet I still watch football.  I’m conflicted, but I watch.  Other sports, like hockey (Go Hawks!), just don’t have this kind of swirling controversy, misogynistic or otherwise.  The NHL, though, is small potatoes compared to the behemoth NFL.

The recent NBC News/Marist poll showed 86% of fans haven’t changed the amount of professional football they watch.  That means that 14% that have stopped watching, or are watching less.

The problem isn’t NFL commissioner Roger Goodell.  He didn’t punch Rice’s fiancée in the face, knocking her unconscious. This is just the most recent NFL black eye (ugh, sorry) which reveals a deeper, disturbing, systemic malignancy now dragged into the sunlight by the press and social media.

Yet I still watch football. It's a dilemma for me, and others, I'd bet. The NFL counts on this cognitive dissonance, or holding two opposing views at the same time, to keep the money rolling in.  George Orwell called it double-think.  Football is good AND football is bad.   

The problem is the "bad" is piling up.  Let's look at just the past ten years:

- Concussions. 

- Brain damage - Chronic Traumatic Encephalopathy or CTE. 

- Multiple suicides of retired players (including beloved Bear Dave Duerson in 2011) suffering from CTE. 

- Multiple players going to prison - former New England Patriot Aaron Hernandez now a current convicted murderer. Michael Vick served time for dog fighting.

- Animal abuse.

- Drug abuse.

- Gun charges.

- Rape charges.

- Domestic violence.

- Child abuse.

Holy crap (pun intended).  That lump under the rug is a small mountain now. And it stinks.

As part of the forty percent of female NFL fan base, I’m a football girl teetering on the edge.  I love the game.  I hate the reprehensible actions of some players.  Although I speak only for myself, I know I am not alone.  Many fans, men and women, are teetering, too.

NFL, clean your $10 billion dollar house.  Quickly. Show us you care about the integrity of the sport, not just the money. Show us that you actually want to put a stop to your players' reckless, violent, illegal behavior and not just to bad publicity. Draw a line.  Enforce it.

The mountain of sh*t is rising. The stink can no longer be ignored. Our patience is waning.  We want to stay with you. Give us a reason.  Fix it.  We love our (insert your fav NFL team name here) but our love isn't blind. 

Football is not the only game in town.

GO BLACKHAWKS!