NaNoWriMo Day 5
Welcome to my little experiment, where I lift the curtain on my writing process during NaNoWriMo 2023 in an effort to feel less alone. If you’re also doing NaNoWriMo, feel free to add me as a buddy!
daily summary 📅
As I sat down to work this morning, I had the dreadful, sinking feeling that I was going about this all wrong. Now normally, this would mean I would go back and rewrite everything I had until this point, but the point of NaNoWriMo is plow on ahead. Except I’m a linear writer, so I can’t continue without knowing how I got to this point. So most of today was spent writing my thoughts out by hand, trying to shake the creative ideas loose, and tell myself the story as a long, shitty synopsis. It worked, I think. I have a much clearer picture of the story to this point, even if there has been no forward momentum. Hopefully tomorrow we can get back and track and move the story as needed.
daily process ⏱️
6:35AM. What is even the point of Daylight Savings Time ending or beginning or whatever when you have dogs? So much for sleeping in.
8:17AM. Well, I’ve made coffee, made breakfast, and eaten breakfast already, thanks to having dogs who have no idea or care for Daylight Savings. What I actually wanted for breakfast was a Seoul-style egg salad on a croissant sandwich, but while I had the eggs, I literally had none of the other ingredients necessary—namely kewpie mayo. So I made do with a NYC deli-style breakfast sandwich instead, substituting a brioche bun for a bagel. I have training for Castor later today, so it would be nice to hit word count before then, but we shall see.
Also I got these new Zebra G-402 0.5mm gel pens and I think I’m in love. The weight! The heft! The ink flow! 😍
10:16AM. I’m getting tripped up, I think, by thoughts of what I need/want to revise in the first several chapters instead of figuring out how I want to move forward. I do want to be a little more intentional about things instead of word-vomiting willy-nilly.
So let’s back up and tell myself this story again, rewriting the start in a long, shitty synopsis lol
[748 words of redacted word vomit of me telling the story to myself.]
11:37AM. You know what? I’m going to transcribe this long, shitty synopsis and count that as part of my word count because it IS. Even if the story doesn’t progress, this is actually what happens and it will help me figure out what to write next.
12:06AM. That’s 748 words of long, shitty synopsis. They may not be draft words, but they are still words, and they count!
[806 words of long, shitty synopsis.]
3:17PM. 1554 words. I need to map about Redacted’s chapter before finishing for the day. I am really close to hitting my word count, but I still have a lot of story to work through before I can push forward. The logistics of how to get Redacted to Redacted are something I can worry about tomorrow. But I think Redacted’s chapter starts with her talking to someone at the redacted about getting a contraband copy of The Maiden Who Was Loved By Death.
[365 words of long, shitty synopsis.]
3:42PM. All right, I’m tapped out for the day. I need to take the rest off and maybe play some more Dragon Age for a reset. Hopefully tomorrow I can resume some forward momentum.
That’s Day 5 of NaNoWriMo done! How about y’all? Any successes? Failures?