On the eleventh day of NaNo, my sweet muse gave to me...twenty-five thousand words.
Friday morning, 4:30 a.m.
"Hey, wake up!"
Me: "What?"
Main character: "I need to tell you something!"
Me: "No, damn you! You made me eat Diet Coke and brownie mix! Leave me alone!"
Main character: "I'm only going to say it once, so go get a piece of paper and take notes."
I groaned, then got up, found one of my daughter's many "spy notepads" in the dark, felt around for a pencil, and began listening to one of the saddest and most tragic stories anyone has ever told me. I took notes for a good hour before she finally let me go back to sleep at 5:30.
One of many things I have learned the hard way during these first three months as a full-time writer: When the muse speaks to you, you write it down, because if you don't you will kick yourself later as ghosts of the idea evaporate faster than you can type.
At 6:00 I was up again, getting everyone ready and off to school, and at 7:00 she returned and helped me turn the notes into real, genuine story. At 4:30 P.M., 12 hours after she first woke me up, my main character/narrator/muse/chief torturer had dragged me through the deepest dregs of story that I had ever been through in my entire life. 5,215 words worth. And it hurt. And I cried somewhere in the middle, but I had to go on, because that's what writers do.
During my visit to Japan five years ago one of my stops was at the Ghibli Museum. I had seen many of Miyazaki's films and exploring the museum was one of the highlights of my trip. While there, I read an English paragraph about a film called "Whisper of the Heart," about a girl who wants to become a writer. When I got home I requested the film from Netflix. The main character, Shizuku, spends a portion of the film testing herself as a writer. She isolates herself, challenges herself, pushes the outside world away, and experiences the invasion of her story into both her dreams and conscious reality.
During this NaNoWriMo experience I find myself going through the same kind of ordeal. I thought I understood Shizuku, but I had no idea until today.
When my family came home on Friday we decided to go out for dinner. While sitting at the table, the story that my main character told me was still heavy on my mind and I felt my heart rate shoot up. My daughter was telling me about her day but it was hard to focus on what she was saying.
"So we were swinging on the tire swing and then we ran over to the tire tower and climbed until recess was over," she told me.
"Really," I asked. "Did you call him back?"
My main character laughed in the back of my head.
On Saturday, I had promised myself that I would take a break, but four mini sessions of 500 words each kept me going. She laughed again.
I got you.
On Sunday I forced myself to stop after 600 words. She wasn't there, and it was a struggle. But today I was back at it with a fury when she returned from her break and added 2,543 words to the text. She rewarded me by painting a picture in my mind of a beautiful natural phenomenon that was unfolding in her world. I tried to describe it as it was happening, knowing that I was failing miserably but praying that I could get a replay during revisions. It was something that wasn't part of the original outline, but rather came out of the story naturally as a balance to the hell brought on by the original disaster that first set the plot in motion. What a gift it was!
And what a sense of accomplishment to pass the 25,000 word mark. If I had champagne, you'd hear a pop.
There's just a little problem that I need to overcome now:
I realized today that I'm quickly running out of story.
_____________________________________________
#NaNoWriMo word count so far: 25,151
#NaNoWriMo words to go FOR THE WIN: 24,849
Mood: Accomplished.
"Hey, wake up!"
Me: "What?"
Main character: "I need to tell you something!"
Me: "No, damn you! You made me eat Diet Coke and brownie mix! Leave me alone!"
Main character: "I'm only going to say it once, so go get a piece of paper and take notes."
I groaned, then got up, found one of my daughter's many "spy notepads" in the dark, felt around for a pencil, and began listening to one of the saddest and most tragic stories anyone has ever told me. I took notes for a good hour before she finally let me go back to sleep at 5:30.
One of many things I have learned the hard way during these first three months as a full-time writer: When the muse speaks to you, you write it down, because if you don't you will kick yourself later as ghosts of the idea evaporate faster than you can type.
At 6:00 I was up again, getting everyone ready and off to school, and at 7:00 she returned and helped me turn the notes into real, genuine story. At 4:30 P.M., 12 hours after she first woke me up, my main character/narrator/muse/chief torturer had dragged me through the deepest dregs of story that I had ever been through in my entire life. 5,215 words worth. And it hurt. And I cried somewhere in the middle, but I had to go on, because that's what writers do.
During my visit to Japan five years ago one of my stops was at the Ghibli Museum. I had seen many of Miyazaki's films and exploring the museum was one of the highlights of my trip. While there, I read an English paragraph about a film called "Whisper of the Heart," about a girl who wants to become a writer. When I got home I requested the film from Netflix. The main character, Shizuku, spends a portion of the film testing herself as a writer. She isolates herself, challenges herself, pushes the outside world away, and experiences the invasion of her story into both her dreams and conscious reality.
During this NaNoWriMo experience I find myself going through the same kind of ordeal. I thought I understood Shizuku, but I had no idea until today.
When my family came home on Friday we decided to go out for dinner. While sitting at the table, the story that my main character told me was still heavy on my mind and I felt my heart rate shoot up. My daughter was telling me about her day but it was hard to focus on what she was saying.
"So we were swinging on the tire swing and then we ran over to the tire tower and climbed until recess was over," she told me.
"Really," I asked. "Did you call him back?"
My main character laughed in the back of my head.
On Saturday, I had promised myself that I would take a break, but four mini sessions of 500 words each kept me going. She laughed again.
I got you.
On Sunday I forced myself to stop after 600 words. She wasn't there, and it was a struggle. But today I was back at it with a fury when she returned from her break and added 2,543 words to the text. She rewarded me by painting a picture in my mind of a beautiful natural phenomenon that was unfolding in her world. I tried to describe it as it was happening, knowing that I was failing miserably but praying that I could get a replay during revisions. It was something that wasn't part of the original outline, but rather came out of the story naturally as a balance to the hell brought on by the original disaster that first set the plot in motion. What a gift it was!
And what a sense of accomplishment to pass the 25,000 word mark. If I had champagne, you'd hear a pop.
There's just a little problem that I need to overcome now:
I realized today that I'm quickly running out of story.
_____________________________________________
#NaNoWriMo word count so far: 25,151
#NaNoWriMo words to go FOR THE WIN: 24,849
Mood: Accomplished.
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