In November, I did something that I had not done since 2021: I signed up for NaNoWriMo (National Novel Writing Month). And in doing so, I did something I’ve never done before: I signed up for NaNoWriMo expecting to fail.
The last time I participated in NaNoWriMo, I was in the midst of grad school, and I think the only thing that saved me was that it was 2020, when most of my (and my children’s) extracurricular activities were postponed until who-knew-when. Was I still stressed out? Yes. But I validated a 51,000-word manuscript by the 25th of the month.
In 2021, I had just started a special education certificate program that required me to take more courses per semester in order to stick with my cohort. With sports and music programs in full swing again, I made the tough decision to forego NaNoWriMo in the interest of spending time with my family and keeping a shred of sanity. What made my decision particularly tough was that, in March of that year, I’d had a brainwave, and a new story idea was born. Despite this brainwave coinciding with a new semester at a new school, I split my time between typing papers and typing the story. By the end of June, I’d written close to 114,000 words. Then my creativity fizzled out. There was a two-year period in my story line in which I needed the characters to develop, but I had no idea what events would cause that development. I knew what would happen at the end of those two years, but as for filling in the details, I was stuck. NaNoWriMo would have been a great time to wrestle with that, but even if I hadn’t been stupid-busy, I’m not sure if I would have made progress.
Last year, I felt guilty for opting out for a second year in a row, but no new ideas—or even old ones—had occurred in my year-plus of writing abstinence. Even though I knew I would finish my degree by the end of the month, it wouldn’t be enough time to squeeze 50,000 words in. And I was so burnt out that I was grateful for the lack of pressure.
Why is there so much pressure with NaNoWriMo, by the way? It’s kind of an honor system, although I believe that most people who are crazy enough to sign up to write 50,000 words in a month will see it through properly—or proverbially die trying. I put all that pressure on myself. While fellow Wrimos supported me every year, it was me who was upset if I didn’t make a certain word count in a day. So as November approached this year, I knew that it was on me to take the plunge… or not. I hadn’t written anything new in almost two-and-a-half years. I’ve edited some since 2021, but what if editing was all I had left? Signing up for NaNoWriMo seemed like a final test. Can I still write? That was a more important question than, Can I write 50,000 words in a month?
At the end of October, I signed up, deciding that I would return to my unfinished manuscript from early 2021. It was November 5th before I had time to even think about starting, and when I did, it was only in short spurts. My momentum didn’t start until the week of Thanksgiving. At that point, I knew I was capable of making up my paltry word count—after all, for my first ever NaNoWriMo in 2013, I wrote close to 5000 words on my first day. But that kind of passion was absent this year, leaving me with more of a slow burn. The poor NaNoWriMo stats tracker eventually gave up on telling me how many words I needed to write in a day when the daily goal exceeded 8000.
Here is what I did do in November: I spent time reading a fabulous book (The Running Grave, sequel to The Ink Black Heart, if you read my last post); I enjoyed a day trip to Savannah with my family (also in my last post); I did some much-needed cleaning/decorating/straightening around the house we moved into two months ago; I gave my family and our pets more attention than I have in Novembers past; and I ultimately lost NaNoWriMo for the first time, writing just over 9000 words.
But if you don’t live, what is there to write about?
I don’t know what future Novembers will look like, but now that I’ve lost and survived it, it feels… good. My writing has slowed down, but in this slower season, I will keep moving forward in manageable chunks. I now know the answer to my initial question: Not only can I still write, but by allowing myself to change my pace, I’m even enjoying it again.
Full-Time Writer Mom 
[…] This year was the ninth time I’ve won, although they weren’t consecutive wins. The first eight years I participated (2013-2020), I won every time. Then I took off 2021 and 2022 when I was bogged down by grad school, my creativity all but depleted. (I was also in grad school in 2019, but looking back at those stats reminds me how badly I struggled. I was able to participate in 2020 because I took the fall semester off, and honestly, what else was there to do in 2020?) Last year, I decided to participate almost one week into the month, knowing that a win was far from likely. Why did I do it? To make a long story short, I wanted to make myself write again, and I also wanted to show the perfectionist in me that it’s okay to fail. (Read the whole story here.) […]