Bless Me Father.....

One of the features of blogging anonymously is that you can be whoever you want to be.....
A casual observer of this blog might have noticed a lack of activity here of late, seen mention in recent posts of nanowrimo and deduce that I am now sitting back recovering with a smile on my face and a 50,000 word first draft under my belt. Oh, I could flesh out that image and no-one would be any the wiser.....however.....
you can take the girl out of the confessional box but you can't ...etc etc.
I got off to an enthusiastic start with my novel-writing month and it was great to reconnect with my story. Then I turned my attention to my weekly homework from my poetry school class with Shamshad Khan and quickly realised that I had a Harry Hill type fight on my hands - poems versus the novel - if you get my drift. It didn't make sense to have signed up for Shamshad's class and then not have a poem to work on each week. I decided to come back to the novel between classes - which gives me five weeks when this course finishes and before I start my next one in the middle of January.
So what have I been up to? Well, my decision paid off and I've written several poems, one or two of which I'm very pleased with. I've also assembled a small collection for the Poetry Business pamphlet competition. That's now in the lap of the gods, well, Simon Armitage actually, so we'll see what happens. 
Most exciting of all.....drum roll.....I've been asked to take part in a poetry reading in Liverpool next Wednesday! First gig! A poet I met a couple of years ago at a Poetry School class is setting up a new event and asked me to contribute a 15-minute spot. This weekend I'll be selecting a play list and weighing up my wardrobe.....
All in all, a firework-filled November!

(Now I must look at some of those Harry Hill fights I drew attention to earlier...)

November Countdown

The clock has started ticking, nearly one day of NaNoWriMo down, only 29 to go. 

I read through my novel notes at the weekend and was quite impressed - what I've done so far is not bad! Very detailed background to the characters and some story, which I can rework. Nanowrimo forbids pasting old material into the new document, which is fine by me. Rewriting the plot will be good and will freshen it all up.

I say 'will be' because today has been very busy and my word count is only 147. Still, that's ok too, I will make up for this later in the week when I get on a roll. At least I've made a start.....

Self doubt, writing, swimming...

The last couple of nights I've had dreams about my novel, anxiety dreams which seem to be trying to convince me that this novel in a month lark is too silly for words and too difficult,  so just pack it in...

To write 1700 words a day for 30 days I think I'll just (!) have to start getting up earlier, say at 6 o'clock, to get an hour in before the day gets going...

And I recognise that treacherous process - exactly the same as when I face some new stretch of cold water, anxiety and self doubt creep up...the only way through is to lower myself in and silence the voice by swimming...

NaNoWriMo

At the side of the blog in the little description of myself, I casually mention how I 'plan the novel'. 

A couple of years ago I had what I consider to be a good idea for a novel. The working title was Yummy Mummy (now a bit out of date as a concept, I fear) and I'd worked out a fair bit of the plot and characterisation etc etc. Since starting the blog, my poetry (and swimming) have come on a treat, but the novel is languishing in an unvisited dungeon of my mac.

Reading Michael Farry's blog this morning I became aware of National Novel Writing Month. What a fantastic, mad idea!! One month to write a 50,000 word novel, where quantity and not quality is absolutely the name of the game! No time for editing, just bang out a draft and if it's done by midnight on 30 November, then you are a WINNER! All of the publicity for it is fun, fun, fun! To sign up, you have to be over 13!!! That alone makes me want to register, if a 13-year-old can do it, then why not me?

So, I've got 7 days to unlock the dungeon, dust off the document, generally limber up and make my way to the starting blocks for 1 November. Anyone else care to join in ?!!