Anyway, I guess my eighth grade award was right about one thing - I have always loved writing. I used to think that someday, in the vague future, I might write a book, if I ever came up with a good idea. When I envisioned that vague someday, it was about 30 years in the future, when my children were all grown up, and I'd write while sitting on the porch of the Italian villa I owned.
Well, 30 years and my Italian villa will have to wait (let's be honest, I'll probably be waiting my whole life for the villa). I'm going to write it now, when my kid is not even close to grown up, sitting right here at my kitchen table.
Last week, when I was in Saint George on vacation, I woke up in my hotel room at 4am and thought "I have a good idea for a book!" so I grabbed the Best Western pad of paper and started writing. When both sides of those papers were used up, I wrote notes on my phone. And then, at 8am, which I deemed a more socially acceptable time to ask for more paper, I went down to the lobby to pick up a few more sheets. It made for one tired adventurer that day, but I was really excited about my idea.
Since then, my excitement has definitely waned, and has been replaced by the realities of writing a novel. You guys. It's hard (and I haven't even really started yet!). Anyone can crank out a 500-word blog post, but a novel with 50,000-100,000 words?? That's crazy. Not to mention, this is on top of everything else I do (I'm still not sure where my novel-writing hours are going to come from).
To be honest, I'm terrified.
But I'm doing it anyway.
I'm going to participate in National Novel Writing Month (abbreviated to the weirdly catchy NaNoWriMo, or sometimes just NaNo). It's where 300,000 people across the country write an entire novel in one month.
I'm not writing my novel for the intent of publication. In fact, I'm almost 100% sure I'll never even let anyone read this novel. But I want to prove to myself that I can do it, and it could eventually lead to a good novel (you know, 30 years down the road in my Italian villa ;). This week, I've been reading, researching, outlining, interviewing people and googling random things to prepare for November 1, and even this stage in the process has been really engaging and fun for me.
Anyway, now that I've declared my goal publicly this blog, I have thousands of people to hold me accountable! Don't let me quit. Ask me how it's going. Tell me to get off my blog and work on my book ;)
Has anyone else ever done NaNoWriMo?
Or written a book?
Or maybe just have a super motivational quote for me?
I need all the help I can get!