The 30 days of NaNoWriMo - Nov. 1

The Day Nano began I was so excited, but nothing hit my mind.  What would I write about?  How do you enter 30 days of intense writing without knowing where you're going.  Let's wait and see.  Here we go.  (I just changed that from I go to we go.  I’m going to take you with me.)  NaNoWriMo

November 1, 2014, The Day Nano Began

I wasn’t thinking of Nano when I got up today.  Neither time.  At 4 AM I was restless and was having a hot cup of tea at the dining table when I heard a noise.  What else could it be, but a very large, very healthy mouse.  Apparently I was unexpected because once he saw me he really took off.  (I hope it’s a he.  I really don’t want it to be a mommy with babies.)  I decided to leave a note for my ever-lovin’ man so he’d take care of it.

Back to my Kindle, which I have almost worn out, but on which the stories seem eternal, I was sipping my tea and reading and I heard more noise.  Not exactly a quiet night, was it?  The noise came from the kitchen and I was sure it wasn’t the mouse.  Mice can’t crawl along the ceiling - at least I’ve never heard of one doing so.  I got up and looked up at the skylight.

It sounded a bit like . . . . rain. . . . rain hitting the skylight.  I remember.  Before we had this seven year drought (or three year drought, depending on who you listen to), I loved the sound of rain hitting the skylights.  Almost as much as the moon shining down through them to make big ghostly squares on the floor.

I grinned and was happy inside.  I like rain anyway, and this rain was more than welcome.  I could hear it falling softly on the ground, all dusty and covered with bits of dead vegetation.  No, not the rain all dusty.  The ground all dusty from not having rain.  That’s what I meant.

When I finally went back to bed, I fell asleep listening to the rain drip onto the verandah, where the gutters dipped and poured out their load of rain.  It’s a nice way to go to sleep.

So, I wasn’t thinking of Nano when I got up the first time.  I was thinking of lovely, welcome rain.

The second time I got up, the  everlovin’ was up and the dog was hungry and everlovin’ and I both wanted the microwave at the same time.  We were too groggy to argue and it worked out.  I got to use it first because I’m a spoiled woman. 

It wasn’t until I logged onto Facebook that I remembered Nano.  I guess you could say my granddaughter Brynne reminded me and asked me if I’d signed up and begun to write.  She lives in Finland and so she had a head start on the day.  I live in SoCal and I never have a head start on anything.  But Brynne was excited and raring to go.

Brynne set herself a goal of 2000 words/day.  (I just typed 200 words/day.  Wouldn’t that be easy?)  Me, I know I’m going to want to do something else now and then, so I set a goal (privately) of 2500 words/day. 

You know Nano is all about words don’t you?  How many words you can type in 30 days, or “Can you type a 50,000 word draft in just 30 days.”  I did it before and I pretty much liked what I had done.  Of course, I then had it printed and bound (Kinko’s) and set aside for the day I’d turn it into a great mystery.

Problem was, I didn’t like the beginning.  I tried and tried and tried to make it work.  I’d leave it sitting for a month or two, then go back and work on it until I was too frustrated.  It took more than five years for me to realize that if the beginning wouldn’t work for the book, I needed to dump it.

So I dumped the beginning and tried to make the book work.  I really love the idea of the book and it’s story, but I think now that Nano’s over for that book, I’ve lost the free flowing stream of words that seemed so good.  I’m wondering now if I should just put that book on the shelf and sigh now and then that I hadn’t finished such a good idea.

So, Brynne also enlisted her mom, my daughter who calls herself Woosi, to also do Nano.  She has an idea that has her excited.  Brynne is going to redo part of her previous book, but count only the words that she’s written new.  Woosi’s Nano name is WeSoGonnaWriMo.  On the spur of the moment, I decided to be WeSoGonnaWriMosMama, but I need a nickname.  That’s too much to write again.  Maybe I’ll be MamaWeSoGo, or GoMama.  That’s good.  GoMama. 

Brynne has formed a group with which she will do Nano.  She likes to talk about what she’s doing.  I’d rather be writing.  I like it to be my brain, the keys, an my computer.  No cat.  Dog, but he doesn’t bug me much.  I don’t need company.  My mind will just take me here and there and my fingers will type out the story into my computer.

It’s night time again.  We’re turning the clock back and hour tonight.  For what purpose absolutely no one knows.  People stumble around the idea, but basically we seem to be stuck with it.  When we lived in Arizona where there was no daylight savings time, it still bugged us because we had to factor in what time it was in the place we wanted to call.  I can sincerely tell you, it’s very nice not to live under daylight savings time.  No children die.  The food supply stays fine and I still had a job.  I just didn’t have to adjust my body and my thinking twice a year to accommodate changing how time works.

There’s a thought.  You really can’t change how time works, you can only change how you use your time.  Time is just time.  Someone once told me that time exists only because people want it to.  You’d still have day and night and summer and winter if you didn’t have time.  They would come along just fine.  You could just accept the way it was and let it come.

I’ve been watching the word counter on my Word program.  It just keeps rolling up the numbers as I write.  It says I’ve written 1,117 words at the point where I typed the number.   It’s silly, but it feels significant to me to have met the 1 thousand mark.  That’s enough for me to feel serious about it. 

But you know, I’m running down.  I want to finish this day and begin new tomorrow.  So, I’m stopping at 1,174 words.  Good night.  (I added in the words I type after - except for the words in parenthesis.)