Day Fourteen

Again I'm blogging this the morning after, but I was just too tired last night to blog then. Boy was it a day, but boy was it a good one. I even managed to not completely ignore my husband! I keep telling him I feel bad neglecting him so much since it seems like I'm either working or trying to write (with occasional moments of "I should really clean up a bit around here..."), but he reminds me every day that this is my dream and that if I give up now I probably won't go back. I have to write. I can't even begin to describe how amazing and also how incredibly essential having the support of someone like that is in this endeavor. I couldn't do it without him. I would never push myself far enough. He told me yesterday that the majority of Wrimos don't win NaNoWriMo and that a big majority of the winners aren't first timers. He reminded me that if I fall behind and don't hit the 50k by November 30th, that I was still chasing my dream and that was what was important. There was no shame in not winning NaNoWriMo. It just made me want to win even more.

So I went to the write-in yesterday excited to actually get something done. I knew I would write at least something there and hopefully it would be enough that when I came home I could go over my 1667 words so I can try to play catchup, as I feel I'm always doing now. I was at a spot where I sort of knew what was coming up, but once again just wasn't feeling the transition. My crazy guild of writers came to the rescue once again. They fed me homemade cookies, made me laugh until I almost cried, made my hopes and dreams soar even more, got me out of a very awkward spot in my novel and did so with the perfect explanations so that my writing still flowed, and forced me into the box of doom twice which I successfully emerged from both times. I was handwriting so they decided that since I write fairly small, 2 pages was a good challenge for me. They'd been watching me write and knew I'd have to write almost nonstop for 30 minutes to successfully achieve that. I wrote just a tiny bit more than 2 both times, then add that up with the other sporadic writing I did and it knocked me over 20k! But was I happy with that? Absolutely not. 20k was exciting and I bought the NaNoWriMo shirt I've been wanting to celebrate it, but I'm supposed to be at 25k tonight if I'm going to get back on track. So 20k wasn't good enough. No. I pushed until I hit 21k. What a rush! Oh my goodness, I'm feeling the story run through me right now like the blood in my veins and I hope it doesn't stop. I can't wait to start writing tonight.

My characters are now truly becoming people in their own right. I got not one, but two surprises from characters yesterday. One got surprisingly darker, and not in magic but mood. I wasn't really expecting it, but looking back I'm so very very glad that he did. It added a whole knew element to the story and made some of the upcoming scenes more plausible. Another character got a bit more harsh in her ways, but it was a necessary character aspect that needed to develop. She's carrying quite the weight of responsibility on her shoulders and she needs to be a take-action sort of character. But my poor main character? He's still finding himself. No longer wondering aloud all the time about it, but still doing it just in his actions. Maybe that is a theme of the story, one that is developing that I never intended to be there? I could see it fitting though. Something I look forward to playing with in my second draft (under the hope that I ever get there).

Do I think I can hit 25k tonight? No. Not saying I won't try, but I do have a few things at home that I must take care of that can no longer wait and must be done today. It will cut into my writing time by probably at least a couple of hours. I want to hit 23k. If I can do that, I will be tolerably content with myself. 23.5k is the real goal though, because that will allow me to play enough catchup that I will be able to officially catchup by tomorrow or Wednesday. That is, if I can keep up this speed.

Words Today: 2743
Total Words: 21024

Yours Truly,
Mrs. C