I’ve been buried in grant writing this week for the day job, which has not played nice with my ability to sit down and write fun stuff (other than yesterday’s 2700+ words of tangent notebook additions). I’ve also been way behind on my blog reading. I happened to pop over to my friend Joely Sue Burkhart’s blog to check up on her progress;
NaNo Total: 30,153 words
Two words: Holy crap.
We are at the midpoint of Week 2. WEEK TWO! And she’s already past the halfway mark of the 50k NaNo goal. I am at… Well, I don’t actually know, because I took down my NaNo counter. Somewhere around 4k?
Week Two is the infamous NaNo Slump, when the excitement of Week One (which I spent under the influence of massive quantities of Nyquil, remember?) has worn off and we all hit that “I can’t do this” “This book is crap” “What was I thinking?” “I don’t know what comes next” blah. And I look over at someone like Joely and see her just rocking it out and totally kicking ass, and I’m just in awe. You go girl!
I got off to a rocky start being sick, so I’m not going to beat myself up over the fact that I’m not going to make my 50k by the end of November. That’s not lack of confidence, that’s just reality. In addition to the day job, I’m starting the design of my new class that I’ll be teaching in the spring, finals are approaching in the 3 classes I’m teaching now, there are home improvement projects that must be done prior to the invasion of family the week of Thanksgiving, and there are just so many hours in the day. I’m already chronically underslept, so getting up even earlier for the month of November just isn’t gonna cut it for me. But I have a decent beginning to my 70 Days of Sweat (despite yesterday’s detour), so I’m going to let go of my NaNo Neurosis and focus on that.
I simply will never be the hare in this race. Just like I’m never going to be 5’10” and model thin. I’m okay with that.
2 thoughts on “NaNo Neurosis”
There are two key things that made 30K possible so quickly. a). this is my fourth day of vacation from the Evil Day Job and I have 5 more days coming (although with 15 people coming for Thanksgiving dinner…) and b). this is a story I adore. I’ve dreamed it for years. I’ve ached to write it for years. Writing it is like a dream. Not to say it’s easy, because it’s not. I was so depressed yesterday that I almost bawled at the drop of a hat, and I know it was the emotion from the story. I guess some stories are simply meant to be, and this one happens to be mine.
Oh, and I forgot to say don’t sweat NaNo or Sven for that matter. I may “win” NaNo, but I’ll still be grinding away well into Dec and possibly beyond (I think this could be a 120K story). As long as you’re making progress and reaching your goals, that’s what matters. Of course the fever and energy of organized challenges can help!