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I'm a huge fan of NaNoWriMo and probably make it sound like it's all unicorns farting rainbows. Alas, it is not. All these years I have harbored a deep, dark secret. I thought that I was the only one until I saw the following tweet from Derek L Reiner (@DerekReiner) on November 16, 2014:
#NaNoWriMo turns me into someone I don’t like. I doubt I could
write professionally as the deadlines would turn me into a monster.
I could have hugged the man. I am not alone! I could finally air my dirty little secret – NaNoWriMo turns me into a monster. There. I said it. For thirty days, my world revolves around reaching the 50k goal and heaven help those who get in my way. In order to write 50,000 words in thirty days, you must write an average of 1667 words per day. Life being what it is, I don’t get to write every day which means that I have to double up on other days. I find myself struggling to be nice to those around me. Heaven help my hubby if he invites me to go to a movie, or something else equally innocent. He deserves better than the response he receives. I snarl at him, my newly grown NaNo fangs dripping venom: “A movie? Are you kidding me? It’s NaNoWriMo – I’ve got 2000 words to write! I don’t have time for a movie.” He slinks off to hide in another room while my claw-tipped paws return to tapping out words.
Okay, that may be a slight exaggeration, but only just. Most of the time in November I seem like a normal, friendly, middle-aged woman. Most of the time I manage to keep my sarcastic replies locked away inside. On the outside I say “A movie is a wonderful idea! What would you like to see?” while on the inside the NaNo monster howls and threatens to burst out of my chest and rampage through the Nostromo, sparing no lives. Wait, wrong monster. Any way, you get the idea.
To make matters even worse, November is when we celebrate both Thanksgiving and my birthday. The past few NaNos have not gone well for me. November turned out to be the month when an elderly parents health began to fail or one of them passed away. Now that they are no longer with us, my husband has stepped up to fill in the gap and will be having surgery on the shoulder he damaged while we were getting our house ready for Hurricane Michael. So, now that I think about it, may the real monster is November. It senses my determination to compete and throws obstacles in front of me - occasionally insurmountable ones.
However, I'm entering this year's NaNo with a different mindset. Yes, I would like a successful year to prove to myself that I can still do this. However, the past few years have taught me that it's okay to not "win" - it's not the end of the world. So, win or lose at the end of the month I will have quite a few words written that I didn't have before and I'll have a novel ready to go into revisions. So, whether it's a "win" under NaNoWriMo guidelines or not, it will still be a win for me.
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