NaNoWriMo – Week 1 recap

 

            My first NaNoWriMo week – a recap.

            Saturday October 31, 2009.  I’m in Scranton for the weekend to visit my parents and to see my son and my nephews second but first Halloween together.  (It was technically their second, but last year they were practically newborns, so we didn’t get to have too much fun.)

            My son was a tiger that lasted five minutes.  My nephew was a puppy dog that lasted about ten minutes.  Don’t worry, the costumes were not a waste of time – I have a few pictures of me wearing my son’s tiger head and my Dad wearing my nephews puppy dog ears. . . classic.

            The rain had made the day and night somewhat of a bummer as we didn’t get to take the babies out – all night I kept that if I was a kid, I’d be royally pissed knowing that Halloween was almost rained out.  

            The Phils were on the tube and were beginning their decent into a long few days of defeat to the Yankees. 

            In the back of my mind, I could hear a keyboard clicking.  I could see a desk, dimly lit.  I could see a guy hunched over the desk, eyes bulging, hacking away at the keyboard.  I could see empty coffee cups scattered across the desk.  Then I realized – it was a vision into the future. 

            NaNoWriMo started great.  I went right into my story – a story that had been brewing in my mind for weeks.  I did NOT write anything for the novel before NaNo started.  Since it’s my first year, I wanted to go in with a real 0 word count. 

            The past week hasn’t taught me anything new, but rather reminded me of why I write – because I love to.  The five minute breaks from life when my son is watching Elmo’s world and my wife in the phone I sneak away into the dining room to pick up my story.  The two minute breaks at work when the phone stops ringing and the office is empty, I hurry and jot down some notes.  And I must admit that NaNo couldn’t have come at a more PERFECT time for me. 

            I had just broke the halfway point to a novel that I erased on purpose a little while back.  I got 35,000 words into and decided I hated it.  So I started from scratch, battling myself every day about the story.  And my break has come in the form of NaNo.  And it’s been great so far and I can’t wait to keep pounding away at the keyboard and keeping my “plan” moving forward.  What’s my plan?  Read it here:  http://wizworld.wordpress.com/2009/10/26/the-plan/

            Now I can’t wait to finish NaNo and get back into the other novel.  Ideas are coming to me like crazy and I feel alive again.  I feel ready to conquer the literary world as I did three months ago. 

            AND if things couldn’t go any smoother, I received HUGE writing news all week long.  I sent out a story for an anthology.  Got the news it was picked up to be published.  I wrote a ten sentence story for Pen 10 Sribes. . . got picked up!  http://pen10scribes.blogspot.com/2009/11/unnoticed-by-jim-wisneski.html

            The first publication that picked up my story. . . well, I sent one in and they rejected it.  What did I do?  (First, I wrote a new story, sent it, and they accepted it – see, persistence pays off!)  I send the rejected story to Flashes in the Dark and they picked it up!  That will be published November 14, 2009. 

            So that’s three stories for the week – a personal record for me.  Then comes Saturday.  My wife gets the mail and there it is – a white envelope with my label to myself on it. 

            “Another rejection letter,” I said to her.

            “Oh yea?” she says.  “Congratulations, you have won first place in The Starving Writers quarterly contest. . .”

            I won?  I won?  No, seriously, I won?

            It was such a great feeling to win a writing contest . . . something I haven’t done since I was in grade school when I wrote a poem about a pig with hair.

            The week has been good to me.  And for me, I’m just getting warmed up.  I just broke the 15,000 word mark on my NaNo novel and the ideas are still flowing.  My biggest fear with NaNo was that I’d get the general idea of the novel down and then run out of ideas. . . say at about 5,000 words.  That hasn’t happened yet and I won’t allow it to happen.

            For those who aren’t buddies with me on NaNo, my name is JimWisneski (I know, how original!).  For those not following me on Twitter, my name is @Wisneski.  For those who have read this, THANKS!  Now share your first week of NaNo – or anything in general that has happened.

Jim

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