So today marks the end of another month of writing towards that "elusive" 50,000 word goal. Yes...I've reached it again. I crossed the imaginary finish line with one day to spare. This is number 8 for me...in a row in fact. I guess I should feel proud of this; that I can string sentences together to form that length a work of fiction.
But I must be honest to myself and say that I don't think I'll do much to this piece of writing for some time. There are lots of plot holes large enough to drive a Star Wars battle cruiser through, characters who have all kinds of weird motivations - depending on where in the story I'm writing about them. I think there are at least three different descriptions of the same events, since I wasn't satisfied with how the first two sounded...or the third one for that matter. If I ever do something serious to this pile of words no doubt there'll be a fourth version! In short, this was definitely a very "by the seat of my pants" writing experience. Previous years that has worked well for me...but this year it was a slog through heaps of self-doubt as to the worth of the original idea!
One thing, other than the utter delight of having the words flow through you as if your characters are talking right to you, that has kept me going through these years of NaNoWriMo is the group of friends that I've gained through all the get-togethers and write-ins we've had (both during NaNoWriMo and outside of that), and this year for several completely understandable reasons those get-togethers have been pretty scarce. Now I don't mind writing on my own, but I must admit to missing my friends and the camaraderie we have after several years of knowing each other. Hopefully we can resume that in some form in the new year, once all the holidays are over. Quite honestly I'm not sure I'll do a no.9 if it is like it was this year!
Well...I probably will...right now I am not sure, but come end of October I am sure I'll sit there and try to come up with that elusive spark of "what if..." that'll start the gray matter going again.