On This Thing Called Writing (#7)

I wrote a post about a year ago, in which I mentioned my desire to finish a novel before my fiftieth birthday. That leaves me four-and-a-half years. In addition, I discussed my two major attempts to complete the NaNoWriMo challenge. In 2015, during my first foray into serious fiction writing (since high school), I wrote a measly 18,000 words. Seven years later, I exceeded the official goal of 45,000, by at least 5,000 words. However, the final product was in no way a complete novel. Yet, it was progress. 

That was two years ago. 

Last year, my daughter's sweet sixteen occupied much of my attention during the month of November, so I skipped the challenge. And this year, despite no excuses, I had not planned on participating. That was until the morning of November 1st, the official start of the NaNoWriMo season. It was around 8:45 am, and I had just consumed 1300 calories of leftover Halloween candy in about fifteen minutes. Yes, I calculated both numbers, even diving into the trash to pull out all the empty wrappers. It was a mission that had little to do with writing, yet, it had an impact.

As I have explained in the last few posts, accepting that "sucking at something is the first step to being sort of good at it", inspired me to write up crappy lists of my goals and projects. For the moment, I ignored the messiness, and embraced the fact that I actually did something. And it helped. A lot. In two weeks, I completed several key outside projects, but I also started exercising, and walking about the neighborhood regularly. More importantly, I found myself journaling  daily (so far it has been fourteen consecutive days), sometimes twice in one day. With practice, those lists became more appealing, both functionally and aesthetically, as well effective. That made me feel better, which in turn motivated me to do more.

I was on a roll. 

As a result, in that moment that I finished devouring nearly half my recommended daily caloric intake in the form of Snickers, Reeses' Peanut Butter Cups, and Twizzlers, I told myself it was not a great way to start my morning, let alone the month of November. Calculating the damage was important: exact numbers make things real and tangible, but also actionable. 1300 calories. Then my brain clicked. 1300 was close to 1500, which was associated with a writing challenge that begins on the first of November. And that day was November 1st! Writing fiction daily has been an important goal for me. Although my journaling was picking up, I felt I could do more. How could I improve things? By purposely sucking at writing fiction on a daily basis. And NaNoWriMo would be the process. While I had only done it twice, I made noticeable progress between the two attempts.

Challenge accepted!

And in typical fashion, for me, I failed to write a single word that day. However, unlike my old self, the next morning I sat down and knocked out about 1700 words of a new novel. The successes from the past two weeks inspired me to ignore the prior day's failings, and to take action on November 2nd. And then again, the next morning. On Friday, I was busy, so I considered skipping one day. However, as I knew I would be sitting alone in an office for an hour, I brought my laptop, and wrote 1400 words. My old self would never have done such a thing. Both yesterday and today, I continued the habit, and wrote first thing in the morning, 1500 and 1700 words respectively.

This novel is inspired by Kate DiCamillo's The Miraculous Adventures of Edward Tulane. So, it involves dolls. The first two-thirds of what I have written so far had thirteen dolls and a little girl. But it was not working for me. Starting this morning, I began a different approach, and began with two dolls and a little girl. Well, one doll and a little girl, because I have not touched on the second doll's arrival. This journey has been messy, along with my writing. But, I have consistently sat down and worked on the story, even if it meant starting over. I won't delete the older text; it may still yield inspiration. However, I did not throw my hands up in the air, and stop altogether. Instead, I kept pushing forward.

Sucking at this is going to pay off.

At least, that's what I keep telling myself. And, most of me believes it. 

Let's see what the next seven days bring.