Because, all your ideals and believes, they're not real! But I am.
Thinking about my novel-to-be feels a lot like that quote (by Lara Croft's lover, Terry Sheridan). It's three days until the frenzy begins. I have an outline sketch, a few sentences on the supporting characters, and a page and a half on my main one. I've felt excited and overwhelmed this week, since I've joined the site on Tuesday, but now I'm just... panicking. I've been reading a lot about writing in the past couple of days. (I've been reading on writen for the whole last year, but NaNoWriMo starts this Monday!) I was quite confident when I joined, but now... it feels like I haven't done my homework well (hell, I'm not even adding detail to the outline at the moment, I'm blogging!), I have a lot of details yet to figure out, and a couple of Big Important Questions about my main character and my plot that remain unanswered!
Still, I'm doing it. I'm doing it as passionately as I've ever done anything I've been obsessed with. After all, it's writing. It's writing cca. two thousand words a day, for thirty days. It's about sitting down at my desk (well... actually, my mother's kitchen desk, since that's the only one in the house big enough for me and my laptop - still have to figure out how to heat the kitchen, though...), making no excuses, and typing. For hours. The fact that I've written the prior novel by hand doesn't help, not even a little bit. It's gonna be strange as hell, typing again. But it's the only way, this time.
It's about telling all my friends I've joined this... madness, as others have called it, and not going out as much as I used to in the last couple of months. It's work. And I'm gonna work. Boy, am I gonna work.
So here's the plan. It starts this Sunday right after midnight - if I'm still awake - and this Monday, at about seven fifteen in the morning, if Sunday tv shows turn me down. I'll try - just because people have suggested it, and because I am a morning type, after all - writing until noon every day. Then I'll (hopefully) make lunch and watch a movie (or another Farscape episode or whatever) and maybe talk to other sentient beings. (Who knows.) Luckily, I have the whole week basically for myself and I do plan to use it well! Next week - the dreaded Week Two of NaNo - I'm back in college, with considerably - but not tragically - less free time, when I plan to write in the afternoons or evenings or whatever. (I'm guessing there's going to be a lot of those 'whatevers' in the next four weeks. I don't care.:) My goal is to hit 2k every day, and, luckily, 5k one day of every week. The novel's starting value should be a little over 50k - that's ten times 5. My personal best, by now, is 3,600 in a single day. It took me about four hours. I honestly can't wait to see what my writing will react like once this Hell starts. Writing Hell. Now there's a though. Personal Writing Hell. Are we having fun yet?
There's no reason for me not to finish the dare. Sure, I expect the unexpected. (Like, my ex calls or my future one gets drunk or something.) And there are all the birthdays. But I trust myself - a funny thing to write, even more so because it's true - to keep writing my overall priority for the next month. Thirty days isn't that much. And I am a writing addict. (Except when I'm high on NRE - new relationship energy - and can't write more that thirty pages in one year. Sad, I know. But in those periods I have a lot of fun in other ways.;)
It's incredible that I can be so much excited about something that's, well... hard. Hard as hell. And hot as much. Because... I've pledged for the 50k-in-30days thing. It's one of the many things that have never been on my list of stuff I'd do in my lifetime. (Except for my 101 in 1001 list, of course.;) And I'm doing it. I'm soo doing it.
Just can't wait until the damn thing starts!
