The majority of my writing since college has been technical writing and nonfiction for my employers, so it’s been a joy for me to be able to quit my job and be able to stay home and write — I owe that pleasure to my wonderful and supportive husband, Marshall. Besides being able to work on my ongoing project of writing about the West Virginia stories told to my family over the years by my father, I’ve begun this recent venture of blogging. Yet, I still haven’t pursued what I always wanted to do – write a novel. Well, folks, I’m going to do it now thanks to the momentum of my learning about NaNoWriMo.
I found out about NaNoWriMo one day last month when I was internet surfing for writing venues. As I scanned the home page at the National Novel Writing Month Website, I knew this was just what I needed. I tend to spend an inordinate amount of time editing and rewriting my stuff, a good thing to do, don’t get me wrong, but I stress so much on the quality of my writing that I haven’t been happy with the amount of my writing. I can’t blame this on distractions, because I can let the house fall down around my ears and keep on writing, so why wasn’t I writing more per day than I have been? It certainly wasn’t because of lack of support; my husband was always telling me I should write a novel. I can only say that I must have needed a kick in the butt and I finally got it in the form of my NaNoWriMo discovery.
NaNoWriMo is really a writing program, according to their home page, and they preach quantity, not quality. I think my greatest challenge will be to concentrate on quantity without stopping to research, check my work and edit; I do these things in the first draft stage as if I’m afraid of appearing stupid to myself! So, I will be parting from my anal retentive writing ways and, instead, concentrate on nothing but cranking out 50,000 words of a first draft novel. Not that I think I’ll ever win the Nobel Prize for Literature, but Ernest Hemingway, who did, said, “The first draft of anything is shit”. I have printed that quote and it is hanging over my desk along with my draft outline and character names and notes.
After November 30, this organization helps winning authors who have crossed their 50,000 word end of race finish line with editing and publishing help, so they don’t just leave you hanging at the end of the deadline. It is a fantastic organization and they spend a great part of their time helping and encouraging kids and teen writers in their Young Writer’s Program. They are able to do this work through corporate sponsors such as Amazon.com along with private donations. I believe that good writing and being able to express oneself in an intelligent manner is an important tool that young people must learn in order to be productive members of society. I had two teachers as a child who encouraged me to write, one in grammar school and one in high school and I give much credit for my achievements throughout my life to these teachers and the pursuit of writing. If you are interested in learning more about NaNoWriMo’s work with young writers, donating, signing up to participate yourself or just looking around, click on the link above and, remember, tax time is coming up and your donation will be a tax write-off.
The NaNoWriMo website is brimming with words of encouragement and with over 100,000 participants I will have a huge amount of support from fellow writers alongside me. In addition, I have signed up for the NaNoWriMo Application on Facebook, where they will post my progress and other information on my profile. If you’re interested, you can follow my progress in November and give me a shout out, an occasional word of encouragement or a verbal kick in the ass if it looks like I might be slacking. It would mean a lot to me coming from friends and family. So if you don’t hear from me much in November, you’ll know why…I must WRITE ON!
Peace to you all whatever you may choose,
Nancy Frye-Swope “The Retired Biker Housewife”
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