NaNoWriMo Completed!

I talked about doing it last year.  This year I committed early.  I made a promise to Teresa that I’d not only write for NNWM this year but that I’d also let her read it after it is completed.  It was a race to 50,000 words and I just crossed 50,541  I still have a lot of story to go but that’s the whole idea, get it written.  I still have a lot of raw writing left to do and then there is going to be a deep edit session.  But to ensure I don’t chicken out, she will take possession of whatever I have completed at midnight Sunday.  She says she won’t read it until I clean it up but it’s an insurance policy.  If I weasel out, she has a raw copy to embarrass me with.  So, I’m going to stay on the ball and finish this thing.

I’ve got lots of manuscripts that are half started and never finished.  This thing is far beyond any of them but still has a long way to go.  I’m absolutely positive that the only reason I got this far this fast is because you guys were cheering me on.  50k words takes me half a year at my regular pace.  And when I’m on my normal pace, those 50k words will be in three different stories.  NaNoWriMo worked out great in making me focus on one project at a time and to churn out work and let the editing be done later.  I’m happy I did it but I would have quit if I had done it without ‘coming out’.  There were too many opportunities to say, “Ahhh, next year.’  I’m also not sure if I would have completed this project if I weren’t stuck in a hotel room out of town for two full weekends this month.  Looking at my stats, there were sharp increases on the Saturday/Sundays I spent alone and missing my family.  Maybe there is something to the tortured writer lifestyle?