It's day 5 of the hostage crisis. And by that I mean National Novel Writing Month. And by that I mean a time when people who should ordinarily know better band together by the thousands (no seriously, over 300,000 participants this year) to attempt to write 50,000 words in 30 days. That's a 1,667 words per day for those of you keeping score. It's pretty safe to say individual mileage varies.
It's like sports for book nerds - with t-shirts and everything. And I secretly adore it as much as I openly whine about it.
This is my second year joining in (officially registered) with actual other people. I'd heard about NaNoWriMo years ago when I was writing with friends from high school. We did our own informal thing, which petered out quickly. Last year I stumbled back upon the idea, went to the website and signed up. At the end of October. With no prep. And so many people were talking about more than a month of prep. *gulp* I went to the first meeting (Imagine my surprise: an actual group that held actual meetings in my actual area. Trust me, everyone I've met in this group has echoed that thought. There are reasons.). I was late and had that God awful moment of walking up to a table of strangers where everyone is watching you. Social anxiety super powers, activate!
I tried not to be intimidated by everyone animatedly chatting about their ideas and the finer details of inspiration behind it all. I gave a generic genre for what I was writing, and little more. I've never talked writing shop with anyone in my adult years. I wasn't about to out myself as the resident dork without any shred of hope for a decent book. My idea? Oh it came from a dream I had. My ideas come from all over the place. My imagination doesn't know how to take a day off. But this particular science fiction idea had come to me in the form of a vivid dream of a scene I knew I could build on. (
In the year since then, my writing life has changed. I look forward to getting together with other writing friends, shooting the breeze, talking shop, bouncing ideas around, getting and giving support, so on and so forth. When all things are in our favor, we do so several times a month. Illness, day jobs, family commitments don't always make that possible, but that outlet has been invaluable. I've found my tribe, as eclectic as we may be.
I also drink coffee now, spurred on by a deep need for caffeine and not wanting to be the weirdo at the coffee shop who doesn't drink coffee. That title belongs to a new friend of mine, and I hope she doesn't spit her iced soy cinnamon chai latte on her keyboard when she gets around to reading this. After years of at home coffee fails I finally figured out, by way of my local baristas and a global coffee powerhouse and another new friend who is a coffee aficionado, how to find the right balance of coffee, flavoring and milk to stave off the bitterness in coffee that had long left me a sniffer but not a drinker. Oh, and NOT drinking any kind of instant coffee is a big help in that department for those of you in a similar boat. I don't care what they've mixed in that rectangular tin and called it flavored coffee, it's not. I'll probably never be a coffee purist, but I can now appreciate it. And crave it.
This November, I waffled at the idea of NaNo even though of course I was going to do it again. I narrowed down my choices to two ideas that had been calling to me throughout my year working on another project. I changed my mind a few times and mocked up simple book covers for each one (the better to be invested in your NaNo novel and encourage you to "win", so says the website). For the first time in my entire life, I explained the plot of my selection to a person I was not related to with all the paranoia of someone selling national secrets.
This year's inaugural meeting, I knew and regularly saw several of the people who would be going. I chatted up and online friended newbies who knew no one. I did the same at the next meeting. I was stupid excited at the amount of new faces that continued to show up. And above else, I was thrilled to talk shop and reciprocate endless rounds of "Me, too!" as we shared our experiences and evolving processes. Some days writing is agonizingly slow. Some days it is magically engaging. But having people who get that and march along that same track, regardless of whether they write for hobby, for publication or something else entirely, is priceless.
Apparently I'm a bit of a writing extrovert. Who knew? If not for NaNoWriMo, I certainly wouldn't. So if you'll excuse me, my caffeine is kicking in and I have 1,667 words and a writing assignment to get to. And maybe just one more cup of coffee...
Happy Writing!
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