I know the idea is quantity, but I really am a brevity is the soul of wit type. So, in that spirit. This is my sixth? NaNoWriMo. This year is all about finishing Novel #4.
I have the sketch I’m going to work from, and we’ll see how things go.
me ~2019
Yikes. Well, that’s not a good thing to see. Why? Because this year will be my seventh? year doing NaNoWriMo and I’m still trying to finish book 4.
<head desk>
In my defense though this has been 2020.
But, this points to a larger overall issue in my experiences with NaNoWriMo. I have never successfully finished. Never. Not in six? years. Not once.
I’ve gone into November with plans and schedules, plots and character sketches, scenes planned out – and still never hit that magical 50K. I have come close.
In 2018 I completed 49,870 words.
So, close. So, close.
But, as the saying goes – “Close only counts in horseshoes and hand grenades.”
Pity that.
It took me a while to get over the failure of not making that goal. And then of not making it again. And again. But, every year I bid adieu to my husband and plop myself down at the computer on Nov. 1.
Why? At this point I’m pretty sure I’m not going to hit 50K words. It took me a while to identify the reason I keep coming back to this exercise.
It’s the experience. Every year there are new folks, and old-hands; people with startling ideas and those reinventing the classics. I enjoy that. I love dedicating a month to ‘writing first’ in my life.
So even though I have never successfully completed the NaNoWriMo challenge I have enjoyed the experience. That is what keeps me returning.
Maybe this year.