But How Did You Find the Time?

This is the other question I get a lot.

To be honest, finding time to write was much easier than I had anticipated. No Plot, No Problem and the NaNo forums are full of helpful/panicky ideas, like cooking and freezing a month's worth of dinners and chopping up a whole bunch of veggies ahead of time, because you won't have time to cut your own vegetables in November!!!!!! And you'd better hire a maid because you won't be able to put your own laundry in the washing machine!!!!!

Pish posh.

Here's what I did:
Wrote during lunch breaks at work.
Wrote after Edythe went to bed (generally between 8 p.m. and 10 p.m.) or during her naps on weekends.
Did some extra cleaning/organizing at the end of October so I could slack a bit in November.
Cut way back on internet time.*
Rarely watched TV. **
Tried not to start too many craft projects.
When I got stuck on one part of the story, jumped to another part. Or if I was bored, ended the scene and started a new one. If I was sick of a character, I stopped including her. It's my book, I can do what I want.
Rarely worked out.***

On the grand scale of busy times in my life, this past month doesn't rate anywhere near as high as, say, graduate school, or tech for virtually any show I've done. Or wedding planning. Or having a newborn.

If you're considering participating next year, I say go for it! You can find the time! If you want to.

It's the wanting to that's key.

I'm still writing 1k/day for fun, and can't wait for Script Frenzy in June!

*I think this is critical. I can't help but roll my eyes at the people stuck at 25,000 words today, but with a hundred posts by their NaNoWriMo profiles. That's increasing the wrong wordcount!
**This wasn't a change I made, but I think it did have an effect on my writing time, so I'm listing it.
***Okay, this one was bad. But it also had to do with the time/weather change (it's now dark and cold out so I can't take E for walks when I get home).

Two for One?

Hmnm. I think maybe I've started a second book. I don't know. It's gone off in a very different direction from my original NaNo project. This could be a good thing. Usually I enjoy the editing process much more than the first draft writing process, so I'll go with this extended drafting!

Work has been draining this week. I know all workplaces have their more difficult personalities, but the difficult personalities I work with are certifiable. Really.

I have this fantasy, where I stay home with Edythe and write during her naps. I'd get to see her for more than that hectic last hour before bedtime. We could go to the park, and hang out with my other mom friends, and make crafts together and sell them on etsy. Me and my girl, in our matching dresses that I'd sew. And I'd teach her to cook, and we'd make dinner for Christopher every night. I can see it now. Fire in the fireplace, fresh baked cookies on the table, Edythe and I and the cats, all lined up in a row and with cute little bows on our heads.

Whew! Ah, my tummy hurts from all the laughing. Yeah, that would be fun, living in a cardboard box and eating leaves for dinner.

Christopher and I have an agreement. I can stay home and write once my writing is generating actual income. I know, isn't he just annoyingly practical and unfair?

So, Can I Read the Book?

I've had a couple of people ask me if they can read the book.

The short answer is, no.

The long answer is, it's not anywhere near being completed. When I said I was "finished," I meant I'd hit 50K and had won NaNoWriMo. Even if I weren't still adding to the first draft daily (which I am), when writing at such a furious pace, the first draft is more like a sketch than a fully executed portrait. Add to the mix that this is my first novel, and you can imagine what a sketchy state it's in now, indeed. I'm actually a little afraid to go back and look at the first draft at this point. So I'll just keep making it longer!

A couple of my NaNo buddies are still furiously writing, so I want to give a shout-out and oodles of encouragement to CKHB, Harriet_Vane, crankymama, and Li! Go, mamas, go!

We Artsy Types Know How to Throw a Party

So, you may be wondering, other than adding that fabulous new winner icon to her website, how did RB celebrate finishing her novel?

Well first I told Christopher. He was happy for me, but not jump-up-and-down happy, as he had been to a friend's funeral that day. We opened a bottle of wine, special wine that we'd bought in September and saved for just this occasion. But it had gone bad. We opened a second bottle of the same, tried it, and it had gone bad too. So we toasted with a $6 bottle of Trader Joe's Coastal. And then we had one of those long, stay up way too late and get depressed conversations about What Are We Doing With Our Lives.

The next day there was a trip to the winery, where we exchanged the bad wine for good. The staff was very nice, the drive was beautiful, and Edythe did have fun playing in the leaves outside. But it was also freezing cold, we were in a hurry, and Edythe was a superfuss for the entire car trip.

And now, I'm missing writing every day. I have some more ideas for this novel, how I might take pieces from this project and use them with something else I've had in mind. We'll see. I'm going to write a bit tonight. Maybe I'll keep posting a daily word count, just to keep myself honest. It's interesting, though, that I already find that I read books differently. I pay more attention to structure and how the author reveals things about the characters.

I'll post more thoughts about the NaNoWriMo experience later, but now I need to write.

Edited to Add: 1143

November 23 and Guess What?

(Cue trumpet fanfare.) I finished the novel tonight!

Total Word Count: 50, 042

And now I'm going to back away from the computer and open up that bottle of good wine that Christopher and I have been saving for the occasion.

November 22. Happy Thanksgiving!

Tonight I give thanks for having an imagination, for having the ability to create, and for having a loving family who supports me despite my seemingly neverending supply of crazy ideas.

I am blessed to be able to celebrate today with so much of my family, from Little Edie who smeared apple pie all over her head, to my in-laws who braved the traffic to drive down from New Hampshire, and to my brother and sister-in-law and my Aunt who joined us from afar by phone. I do indeed have a lot to be thankful for.

Not to mention this crazy warm weather! Can you believe we were wearing sandals on Thanksgiving?


Today's Word Count: 699/2,000
Total Word Count: 46,318/50,000 (93%)

November 21

Tomorrow is Thanksgiving, and today it was 70 degrees outside. This is weird but good, because I think the warm weather loosened up my brain as well as my fingers. The story is just flowing now, and I seem to be at the climax, an exciting place to be.

Which, by definition, is what a climax should be, right?

I had planned to take tomorrow off to wallow in pie, but I have a feeling I may be back at the computer before Friday.

Today's Word Count: 2,435/2,000
Total Word Count: 45,619/50,000 (91%)

November 20

So this is it, I'm getting into the home stretch. I'm kind of glad, what with the convenient distractions of relatives visiting and Thanksgiving food to prepare and the general holiday hoopla.

I don't feel like the novel is anywhere near "finished," not even for a first draft, but I'm starting to wrap things up. I don't know whether I'll go beyond 50K, or whether I'll want to start editing it immediately. I had thought not, but this morning a better opening occurred to me.

I am quite glad I'm ahead on my word count. At this point, with only 6,816 words to go, and my typical pace of a thousand words in thirty minutes, I could finish in an afternoon if I wanted to. It's nice to be so close to the end that I can take my time getting there, like savoring the last gooey bite of a Reese's Cup that has partially melted between my fingers. Mmmmn.

Also, I must confess that while I had sworn not to begin any holiday craft projects until the novel was finished, I did go a little nuts at Michaels this weekend with my brother and sister-in-law. And I am determined that Christopher, Edythe and I will be wearing matching hats in our holiday photo this year. Hats that I am making. For the photo we will be taking this weekend.

Relaxing? What is this relaxing you speak of? Relaxing is for dead people. Must... make things... at all times!

Today's Word Count: 1,077/2,000
Total Word Count: 43,184/50,000 (That's 86% to you!)

November 19

If you haven't checked out The Rouge Wave yet, you should, for it is unmatched in its awesomeness. Although I have no interest in writing a screenplay, from my experience reading scripts I can vouch that her advice is spot-on, and is applicable to many forms of literary art. I found this in a post from yesterday:

"So often, if you have a family and a day job, the demands of others encroach upon us. It can be guilt-inducing to close the door and enter the necessary isolation to write. Somebody needs to go to the grocery store, wash the car, pay the bills – and yet you are sitting, alone, doing something that may never pay one red cent. It’s insane. But we need to do it."

That's what I wanted to say today, but she said it so much better. Go read the rest of the column, and her whole darn tootin' blog while you're at it.

And support the striking writers too, please.

Today's Word Count: 2,006 (for the second day in a row... weird)/2,000
Total Word Count: 42,107/50,000 (84%, so close I can taste it)

November 18

I finally hit 40,000 today! But the combination of long stretches of typing and too much baby carrying is starting to take its toll on my arms. Edythe has reached the stranger anxiety phase where she wants to be held by me, and only me, as much as possible. It's very sweet that she's so snuggly, but my arms are tired.

We had an excellent dinner tonight with my BFF and her two daughters, who are nearly 4 and 3. Watching the almost-four-year-old engage in imaginative play was interesting, because most of us did it at one point, constructed these worlds and acted out scenes with our invented characters. But when do we lose that ability to play and not care who is watching? I blame middle school. Middle school stinks.

I'm losing a bit of novel-steam these days, and am feeling a bit preoccupied with getting ready for Thanksgiving and visiting relatives and my really packed week at work.

Today's Word Count:2,006/2,000
Total Word Count: 40,101/50,000 (80%)

November 17

I had planned to try to get to 40,000 words today. But instead, Little Edie and I spent some quality time with my brother and sister-in-law, and now I'm going to hang out with my husband. In short, I'm spending the day with real people instead of imaginary ones. An excellent decision.

Today's Word Count: 1,053/2,000
Total Word Count: 38,095/50,000 (76%)

November 16

Christopher just got home from work, and I finished my word count for the day. Time to go relax for a bit. It's been a hectic week.

I think the novel is picking up steam now, heading toward a climax and conclusion, which will be nice to experience. It's been quite interesting writing without a plot outline, because I just make stuff up as I go, and we don't often get to do that in life (not without suffering the consequences, at least). And if I get bored writing a scene, I change it, or I go work on some other part for a while. While I've written a lot of crap, I've also been pleasantly surprised by some of what's happened when I've let it.

Today's Word Count: 2,038/2,000
Total Word Count: 37,042/50,000 (74% of the way there!)

November 15

Yeay, we're back home where we have two computers! I finished adding all the new parts of the novel I'd come up with during my training, and a little more besides.

Today is November 15, halfway day. I'm proud to say that I'm more than halfway through.

And now I must go because The Office is about to come on!

Today's Word Count: 2,004/2,000
Total Word Count: 35,004/50,000 (70% of the way there!)

November 14

Training was long and boring, but I took advantage of the time to think through my plot and make a bunch of notes about how to tie things together, what to add, where the story might go next, etc. So all in all it was a productive day.

We dined at The Galaxy Diner tonight. Peanut butter & jelly milkshakes are where it's at! Little Edie was well behaved, which was fortunate because we made friends with a woman due to meet her own little bundle of joy on Friday. Heh heh. We didn't tell her to enjoy her sleep now. I was hoping she'd order the "Knock me up, Scotty" (I think it's fried pickles and ice cream), but she just got a milkshake and a giant plate of nachos.

I dedicate tonight's word count to Christopher, who let me use the laptop despite having a paper due and a report to write for work. And also to Little Edie, who has not woken up yet, thus allowing me to write.

Today's Word Count: 2, 199/2,000
Total Word Count: 33,000/50,000

In a way I can't wait to hit 50,000 words and be done with this novel, but in a way I think I'll miss it. I'm already planning my next big writing project, and how I'll improve on what I've done this time. So even if this isn't great literature I'm writing now, it's still been an important experience.

November 13

Out of town for training, limited computer access, not much time to write or to post.

Today's Word Count: 747/2,000
Total Word Count: 30,801/50,000

November 12

Too tired to write much, and must pack for my stupid work trip that starts tomorrow. I tried to write a bunch today, because I figure I won't have much time while I'm out of town.

Today's Word Count: 3,322/2,000
Total Word Count: 30, 054/50,000 (60% of the way there)

November 11

Today was a banner day! I broke 25,000 words, so I'm more than halfway there! We celebrated by opening a bag of mint m&ms, first of the season! Those things are addictive. Good thing we only bought one bag.

Also, my novel has suddenly become interesting. I've continued in this surreal adventure vein for a while, and have found it to be great fun. I think I even know how to tie it in with what I'd written before. It's very exciting. My fingers were flying today.

Also, I repotted all my geraniums to bring them inside to try to winter them over, and I planted some pansies and cabbages outside. I find it much nicer to write in cheerful surroundings. And my gardening efforts were an excellent excuse to go to the garden center with Christopher and Little Edie today and gawk at the koi and chrysanthemums and over-the-top Christmas trees.

I wish every day could be like this.

Today's Word Count: 3,679/2,000
Total Word Count: 26,732/50,000 (53% of the way there!)

November 10

I don't want to use this blog as a forum to air my family's dirty laundry. But I do want to be honest about the daily challenges I'm facing. So let's just say that sometimes being supportive is much easier to do in theory than in practice. For me, this applies to Christopher going back to school, and for him, I think this applies to my writing and other artistic projects. If we only had a maid, so we could do our shift parenting thing and still have time to pursue our degrees/artistic fulfillment, and to sleep occasionally, without having to fight about who should have cleaned up what and when.

Little Edie has reached that "caged polar bear" stage where she knocks down, pulls out, throws, eats, or shreds everything she can get her hands on. While I'm picking up the toilet paper she's unrolled, she's pulling all her pajamas out of the drawer and grabbing the cat (the one cat that isn't knocking pictures off the bookshelf or digging up the geraniums I'm trying to winter).

So I can see why one might be frustrated when one comes home from class late at night and the place is a disaster. On the other hand, it's impossible to keep the house clean these days, especially if one is spending several hours a day writing. That's all I'm saying.

We all went out for pizza at The Lost Dog Cafe tonight, because we needed a little family fun time before the holidays, when the true family fights will begin.

Today's Word Count: 1,812/2,000
Total Word Count: 23,053/50,000 (46% of the way)

November 9

I have a bone to pick with Google Documents today. Twice in the past 24 hours it has lopped off the last 53 words of what I have saved. Considering that the program auto-saves every 60 seconds while I'm typing, and considering that I always use the "save and close" function rather than just closing the document, I find this pretty annoying.

I know it has been exactly 53 words each time, since I'm tracking and updating my word counts so often. It's bizarre. I saved my work into a Word Document tonight as backup.

I am still finding this writing process frustrating. First I had a boring, meandering book. Then I tried to give it some plot by making bad stuff happen to my characters. Now I have a boring, depressing, meandering book.

Tonight I went off in a totally different direction, and now there' s a good thousand words of nonsense to add into the mix. At least it was fun to write.

I'm hoping against hope that suddenly the light bulb will go on, I'll see how it all fits together, and I'll have smooth writing from here. But I don't know. I'm not even halfway there yet. I will finish it, because I'm persistent like that, but whether the novel becomes anything is yet to be seen.

Today's Word Count: 2,187 in actually progress, but 2,293 if you count the 106 words I had to re-write because of Evil Google Documents.
Total Word Count: 21,241/50,000 (42% of the way there!)

November 8

I wonder when I'll start to feel secure about this project. I'm writing more slowly and deliberately now, and exciting things are happening to my characters. They've become significantly darker and more interesting. But I can't shake the mean little voice on my shoulder, telling me I'm writing a very crappy book about a subject I remember nothing about, and I should just stop now.

Of course, this is the whole point of this project, isn't it? Not to listen to that voice, and to just keep going? Even if, in the end, it does indeed turn out to be a crappy book, I hope to learn how to get past this point. I hear it gets better, that week three the storm clouds break and the sun peeks through and everything feels sunnier.

For now I'm trying to be useful and channel my novel-writing angst into pre-teen girl angst. Sigh. I have no idea if it's working. This is a very solitary process, which I usually like, but I wish I had some cheerleaders in my corner at the moment. I suppose I could go post on the NaNo forums, but I've been trying not to get sucked in there.

Today's Word Count: 2,189/2,000
Total Word Count: 19,054/50,000 (38% of the way!)

November 7, Part 2

I was blocked today because:

1. My main character is an 11/12-year-old, and I'm not around anyone of that age on a regular basis, so I couldn't remember how they talked, which led to
2. Writing all my dialogue as if my characters were less intelligent and more nice than adults, and

3. Writing with an idea of a climax, but no idea how to get there.

Since I don't have time to go out and volunteer at a tween center to observe this age group in their natural habitat, I was looking online. But you know, it's really hard to find blogs or forums for tweens. Try it! Put in some search terms and see what you get. It makes sense that this stuff wouldn’t be imminently googleable, with all the creeps out there, but it makes research hard for mild-mannered writers like me.

Then it dawned on me that NaNoWriMo has whole threads on their forums for the Young Writers Program participants. And while I didn't get any juicy, spilling-of-guts kind of material, I did realize that young people are just as smart and witty as adults, maybe more so.

And these kids can write! Especially the ones who regularly write fan fiction as a hobby, some of these kids are up to 30,000 or 40,000 words already. And that's with them doing it all on evenings and weekends, and parents limiting computer time. Plus some have written 200+ articulate posts on the forum. I must say, I am impressed and inspired.

I skipped ahead and wrote the first part of the climax. It was fun, much more fun than all this boring, endless exposition has been.

Updated stats for today:
Today's word count: 2,758/2,000
Total word count: 16,865/50,000

November 7

I was going to take a break, and not work on the novel today. I've written all this stuff now, but it's not going anywhere. I bet if I were to copy it into a word document, I'd be somewhere between 20 and 40 pages.

Just tried it. Twenty-four pages, single-spaced.

This is the point where I usually give up on my noveling attempts, and consign them to the folder which is marked "Writing" but should really be titled "Novel Graveyard." I can think of several topics that would be better and easier to write about than the one I'm currently struggling with. My dialogue is clunky, my characters don't have defined voices, and everybody is too nice to each other. I still don't know exactly what the best friend looks like. And I am so tired of describing things!

I took a NaNo suggestion and watched Napoleon Dynamite last night, to get an idea of pacing. Gosh, I love that movie. I've probably seen it a dozen times and it still cracks me up. Also, the scenes are very short. My scenes are very long, usually about 2,000 words per scene, because I end up writing one a day. I don't know where to stop and start. Do I start when the character walked in the door? When they got up this morning? When they were eight? And I can't end a scene until it comes to its realistic and boring conclusion.

Even thinking about it makes me want to take a nap.

Anyway, I did write some today, and I did manage to make one of the scenes shorter. But I'd still kind of like to throw this out and start over completely.

Today's Word Count: 1,471/2,000
Total Word Count: 15, 574/50,000

Blaaah.

November 6

Getting started was much more difficult today. I made some notes, sketched out some ideas of where this all might be going. I may have a general theme now. But in a way, that makes it harder, because now all the text has to mean something, has to contribute to that theme. Whereas before I was just exploring, now I'm starting to do things to my characters, have calamities befall them, so I can start moving the plot along.

Struggles are to be expected at this stage of the game, I suppose. But still, those first 500 words today were hard.

Of course, Edythe also woke up every 90 minutes last night, so I could be experiencing some cognitive issues from lack of sleep. She's so cute, especially when she's sleepy, I don't really mind, until my alarm clock goes off in the morning and I have to go to work and pretend to be functional.

On the other hand, Christopher is being a huge support through all this, bringing me treats, offering to watch the baby so I have time to write, and actually reading my blog. If I can get through this, I owe it in large part to him. Every writer should be so lucky as to have such a staunch supporter.

Daily Word Count: 1,981/2,000
Total Word Count: 14,103/50,000

November 5

I'm up above 12,000 words now, yippee! Nearly a quarter of the way there. If I were aiming for the normal finish-in-30-days rate of 1,667 words a day, this would put me well into week two. Which probably explains why I'm having some of those week two struggles with defining Where This Is All Going.

So far, I've basically written a lot of character-building short stories about these people I'm getting to know. I hope that someday, in their more edited form, these stories will become chapters. But now I need to start finding some unifying theme, some sense of where it's all going, and I haven't quite discovered that yet. In fact, I'm still playing with the age of the main character, so maybe once I figure that out I'll have a better idea of the plot.

I've been pleasantly surprised by how easy this has all been, so of course I now expect to run up against horrible writer's block at any moment. In No Plot, No Problem Chris Baty suggests bolstering word counts on those more difficult days by including long and wacky dream sequences or giving a character a stutter. I'm hoping I won't need to do anything like that, because I'd like what I write to be useful to the book, in some shape or form. But who knows, in a few days I may start setting everything in mirror land where each item has an opposite that requires oodles of wordy description.

Oh, and a word on logistics. I've created a separate gmail account that I use only for novel-related things, so I don't get caught up in e-mail when I should be writing. I have several Google documents containing possible plot points, character notes, etc., and then a big one titled Novel that contains the obvious. I can access my documents anywhere with an internet connection, and every few days I copy the whole thing and save it as a Word document on our home network for backup. This writing is thrilling stuff, eh? Aaaaand suddenly I've turned Canadian.

Today's Word Count: 2,105/2,000
Total Word Count: 12,122/50,000

November 4

Today's Word Count: 2,971/2,000
Total Word Count: 10,017/50,000

Over a fifth of the way there!

Too tired to write more today. Let's just say that I was very productive during my hours of insomnia last night.

November 3

Wheeeee! Writing was a breeze today. I know it won't always be this easy, so I'm going to enjoy it while I can. I keep reading that week two feels like running into a brick wall. But today it went well, and I met my word count during Edythe's morning nap. Christopher has to work today (yes, he always has to work on Saturdays) so Edythe and I will celebrate by going for a hike with our friend Kelly. The weather has been just gorgeous here this week, so I'm glad for the excuse to get out of the house.

Plus, it will give me a chance to work off some of this Halloween candy. It doesn't matter how quickly I lost the baby weight if I put it all right back on over the holidays.

In other news, I made Edythe a sleep sack last night, out of fleece. She's grown too tall for all the ones she had last winter. To my surprise, the project took all of 20 minutes, including sewing! That's rare for me, because I usually have some sort of sewing mishap, putting the garment together backwards or jamming the machine with thread snippings or some such nonsense. But it went just fine. Maybe the creative juices are flowing over from one project into another.

Today's Word Count: 2,230/2,000
Total Word Count: 7,046/50,000

More than a tenth of the way there!

November 2

Writing was a little harder today. I'm still not sure where this is all going, so it's hard to know whether my character would do this or that, and which random tangents I should follow. But I met my word goal!

Today's Word Count: 2,009/2,000
Total Word Count: 4086/50,000

Update later in the afternoon: never mind, found some more inspiration today and did some more writing on a break. So, new and improved stats:

Today's Word Count: 2,739/2,000
Total Word Count: 4,816/50,000

November 1

I woke up at 4:30 this morning with a raging allergy attack, and had two instantly uplifting thoughts.

1. It is 4:30 in the morning, and Edythe hasn't woken up once during the night, and
2. Today is the start of NaNoWriMo!

Since I couldn't get back to sleep, I decided to use the forces of my insomnia for good, not evil, and begin working on the book. And that is how, by lunch time, I reached my daily word goal. Word! Also, my main character now has a name. About an hour into writing, that was not the case. But she has one now!

Today's Word Count: 2,077/2,000
Total Word Count: 2,077/50,000

And now I would like to take a nap, please.