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

Day Ten

Today began in much the same mood of the last two. It's week two and I'm feeling dismal, my inner editor raging at me for the awful work I'm sure I'm producing. Somehow it didn't seem worth it. I'm falling behind every day. Is this really what I wanted this journey to be?

But then I realized something. The middle of the journey is the hardest. It is easy to set off to achieve your goal. It is easy to rejoice when the goal has been reached. But when the days are longer, the excitement has worn down, and the goal seems farther away than when you began...that's when the true adventurer emerges. Or doesn't. Am I a true adventurer? I want to be, so I persevere on.

It was an exceptionally difficult day of writing, but not just due to my word count. This was my first day of emotionally difficult writing, and I know there are more to come in the future.

Today I cried. I apologized out loud to one of my characters as he held the spirit of his dead sister. "I'm so sorry," I said. "I wish I could fix it. I wish I could help you. But I can't and you know that. I want to reach out and touch you. I want to assure you it will be alright. But I can't and you know that too. Still, she can, if you let her. I'm sorry, Chalem. I'm sorry for what must happen. Please forgive me."

Then I cried some more.

Words Today: 1050
Total Words: 14227

Yours Truly,
Mrs. C

Day Six

Writing is hard work!! I'm pretty sure that was my mantra today. I got to my word count goal for the day, but the words just didn't seem to come very easily.

I'd like to take a moment right now and give all of my currently-introduced main characters a talking to.

Kevan: What are you doing? No really, what are you doing? You're confusing even me and I'm the one writing you. If only you would have told me all of this when we started this journey, I could have made your path here a lot easier. Get it together already.
Rekani: You just weren't satisfied with your current role, were you? I do agree with you however. I think you fit better into the role you've assumed now. But please, don't get too overpowered. Keep the personality, but don't become a master of your skills. I quite like you the way you are and I think readers will too. I don't want to have to start cutting your scenes just because you want to be too important.
Chalem: You're only just showing up, but I think you're being an even better dark hero than I'd imagined you as. Good work! You're the only character not behaving badly so far, but I'm sure your time will come.

But on that note...I think I've left off at quite the exciting scene just in time for tomorrow's write-in!

Words Today: 1752
Total Words: 10091

Yours Truly,
Mrs. C

Day Three

Today I realized two things:

1) I'm beginning to remember how much I love writing. Even the parts where I just want to bang my head into a wall because it all feels pointless. Yes my friend, even those.

2) I've developed a terrible habit of being brilliant at work, full of words brimming to the edge of the teacup and spilling into the saucer which then overflows onto my desk and soaks the insurance applications and my checklists and drowns my computer before sweeping up my chair and carrying me off on a sea of text. But at work I'm supposed to...you know...work. So little if any writing gets done, and what does happen is only a few lines jotted down here and there. Then I get home and......nothing. Thus this has developed into a situation I am not fond of.

So for the third day in a row this has been my trend.

But new trends are also beginning. Such as my lead character developing a whole new personality. Had I met this guy 7 years ago when I first had this idea I wouldn't have recognized him. My Kevan, have you changed! Mostly for the better. Though right now he's in some random "searching for myself" mode that I don't quite understand but he insists on being in. Here's hoping he snaps out of that soon. And Rekani? She's a spunky little thing, but I don't think she's really decided how she wants to approach the situation. Then again, what 15-year-old girl have you ever met that knew what she wanted?

But I'm sticking it out. Working hard. Hardly working sometimes too. (Like now, whenever I update my blog.) My word goal for tonight was to reach a cumulative total of 5,000. It was a personal goal, but also the minimum "requirement" goal from Nano's website if you go by their daily counter. But tonight I tried a different approach. I run on Word 2007 and it likes to give me a convenient (and constant) reminder of how many words I currently have in my document. And because it is on the screen at all times, I am checking it every three seconds. Not very conducive to good work. So tonight I covered it up and just wrote until I was tired for the night. To my pleasant surprise I once again both met and exceeded my goal. Good night everyone. =)

Words Today: 2430
Total Words: 6064

Yours Truly,
Mrs. C

Research: Day 1

I've been thinking about joining NaNoWriMo 2010 for awhile now, so what exactly was it that prompted me to take the leap yesterday? A revelation. I'd forgotten the joy of learning something new about a character. It isn't a process of creation, but a meeting of two people when I think of my characters. I don't create them; they already exist. My subconscious is simply learning about them. Together they shake hands, sit down over a cup of coffee or soda or a cocktail (it depends who I'm talking to) and get to know one another. Sometimes I think I know certain characters rather well, so the joy of learning something new about them is an incredible rush of adrenaline. A surge of renewing energy. It reminds me they're still there, sitting quietly in the shadows, waiting for their story to be told.

There has always been a glitch in one of the main characters of this story. She's been running through my imagination for 9 years, but somehow certain traits of her character never seemed to be realistic. At first I thought maybe I was too young when we first met, and I was only paying attention to the key elements of the story while overlooking the all-important underlying details. But as I learned more about the other characters, she stayed the same, unchanging. Until yesterday. It finally all makes sense.

So...does anybody know of any good resources on schizophrenia?

Yours Truly,
Mrs. C