Archives for posts with tag: nanowrimo

Finished NaNoWriMo

December 2, 2011 //
1

I loved when I validated my word count at the NaNoWriMo website and a dozen nerdy people on a video clip applauded me. Their applause made me cry. I love them. I love all my cyber and real friends and family who supported me during my month of extreme novel writing. Thanks!

When I finished NaNoWriMo (national novel writing month) two years ago, I was in the small office at my husband’s family country house. And I cried then too. My tears surprised me. I didn’t realize that you could cry when you impressed yourself by doing something great. I thought tears were for extremes sadness or happiness, not novel writing. Why did I cry?

I cry all the time during commercials or at certain songs at church. I’ve cried twice today already (in a deep conversation with a work friend and then due to some family stress!)

Crying’s no biggie. I tell my kids, It’s good to cry; tears clean your eyes.

So, yes, I love my tears and my achievement. But I doubt I’ll embark on the adventure to write 50,000 words in one month again next year.  (FYI, that comes out to about 175 double-spaced pages.) I think I’ll do it every other year for the rest of my life.

See, this year, I ignored my family, let my house fall into disrepair, and blew off my work peeps who wanted to chat by the water cooler! I’ll take December now to pay attention, to make repairs, and to chat.

Oh, one more thing, please don’t ask to read the novel, because it’s total drivel. It’s a sketch that needs hours, days, months of detail work. And I don’t know if I have that kind of attention in me.

Whether or not, I return to that novel, I’m extremely proud!!

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Categories Uncategorized

Getting Help

October 10, 2011 //
1

No one does it alone. No one.

I am terrible at getting help. So bad. I would much rather be the help than the helped. Having a husband with Parkinson’s Disease, I find his ability to help is diminishing. Of course he still pitches in and cooks dinner, but the quality of his work and the time it takes to get things done is very frustrating. For me. I need help.

On the flight home from Florida, I began to compose a letter to some church friends asking for their help with my darlings while I am going to be away for a few days for a worktrip to New Mexico. But then the plane hit turbulence and I put my laptop away. I have not opened that file. A part of me felt ashamed that I needed help.

In a city and a country of rugged individualists, I felt stupid and weak for asking for parenting and family support.

However, a few recent events in my life and in the world have reminded me that human beings need one another. We are social animals who like to live and work in community. It takes a village. We all need help – coping with an ill spouse, raising children, writing a book, organizing a demonstration or running a marathon. Here are some examples:

1. Occupy Wall Street — if you demonstrate alone, you look crazy. If you demonstrate with thousands of other people, you look like you have a cause.

2. NaNoWriMo — even the loneliness of novel writing can be ameliorated by thousands of on-line and real life friends cheering one another on. Creating small daily goals adds up to big accomplishments.

3. My Daughter’s Soccer Team — it’s much more fun to celebrate a win in a group than to win alone.

This weekend I saw this performance art piece at the foot of the High Line. The women were cutting each other's hair.

4. Haircuts — they just look better when someone else does them. In the same way, you can’t set your own broken arm.

5. My Family’s Well Being — I’ve met with a former colleague who started her own eldercare business and is helping us with Chris’s caretaking and I’ve also met with a lawyer to learn about protecting our family assets. These were huge and difficult calls to make and conversations to have. There’s more work to be done, but it’s a start.

Someday I may get back to writing that letter to my church friends to see if anyone wants to watch Charlotte’s soccer game or share a meal or prod the children to homework while I’m away. But I hesitate to finish and send the letter.

What if no one can help? Then I will end up exactly where I am. And it’s not such a bad place to be.

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Categories New York Stories, Parenting Tweens, Rules To Live By

NaNoWriMo

October 5, 2011 //
3

This November I am going to enter and win NaNoWriMo — National Novel Writing Month.

As the days get colder and my psyche more depressed, I want to hunker down with my dreams, like wrapping my hands around a warm cup of coffee.

Some runners complete the NYC marathon, some women have babies, some consumers shop early for Christmas presents. I’m not those kinds of crazy. I am the kind of wacky that gets up at 6 the morning and stays up until 11 at night (I told you, CRAZY!) hunched over my keyboard, spewing out meandering plot points about imaginary friends.

Why do it? I have a lot on my plate (4 blogs, 3 kids, 2 jobs, and a partridge in a pear tree!)

I do it because:

  1. It is there, like Mount Everest.
  2. My imagination will surprises me.
  3. It’s a communal writing experience. Tens of thousands of writers will appear at the start line, encouraging one another as they write.
  4. It feels so good when it’s done.
If you want some writing done, a novel written, give the assignment to a busy writer. She can do it. This is not the first year I’ve been contemplating nanowrimo Last year and the year before, I wanted to embark on NaNoWriMo, but didn’t want to start a new novel until I rewrote, sold and published my last masterpiece. But life is a work in progress. And so is my writing. Lost characters roaming around my unfinished novels will have to wait. I’ve got something new up my sleeve. And so have you. Think about joining me. nanowrimo sign up now!
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Categories Publishing, Rules To Live By
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