God I hate the second week of NaNoWriMo.
I know, this is only my second annual attempt at writing a novel in month, but I'm noticing a few patterns from my brain.
One is to never ever feed it after midnight. I'd like to take the time now to apologize to that nice farm couple from Wisconsin, I have no idea how I wound up in your garden wearing just a pointy hat and some lederhosen.
I, unlike all of my normal contemporaries, seem to require breaks in between writing sessions. Rather long ones, with a meal or two separating them. It seems my brain goo can only come squirting out in fits that get pounded into a keyboard for so long before smoke pours from my ears and I call time.
But perhaps the greatest lesson I've learned is if I just keep slogging through week 2 I'll see a light at the end of the tunnel and remember to dodge out of the way of the train unlike all the coyote carcasses lining the tracks.
Week one is a strange high, as neural receptors shoot off endorphins each time my fingers hit keys and something approaching a word spills out. I can reach my daily quota no problem, once the dog's been trapped inside her containment bubble.
Come the seventh of November a dark cloud settles upon my little laptop. The words sit stubbornly hidden behind walls, in trash cans or neck deep in mud laced with razor blade refusing to budge. My eye wanders more and more away from the page to shiny things mother magpie keeps bringing me. Apparently she thought I was some kind of disney film and I could really use a dress made of scraps of newspaper and old cups to the ball.
It's a battle between the one side of my brain that says "No, you need to write because if you skip your pattern now, you'll skip it again and this thing will never get done." with the other side that says, "BUT I DON'T WANNA!"
If you can't tell I am firmly embroiled in the middle of week 2, banging my face against the keyboard in the hopes something coherent will come out and I can add that to my stagnant word count.
But if I just stick it out, keep struggling like a man who enjoys wearing large sea birds as accessories once week three hits the words will dig themselves out of the muck, shake some of the dirt off and without apologizing get in line while I stand to the sides a bit jaded knowing that I can never truly trust them again.
And now one more coloring page for any out there who want to color nice things: rainbows, kittens, undead zombie ponies:
Enjoy!
If it makes you feel any better I haven't even touched my novel since Saturday. And coloring that undead zombie pony probably won't help me get further.
ReplyDeleteGood luck for the rest of the week.