NaNoWriMo

It wasn't till last year that I finally heard about National Novel Writing Month, a program designed to help writers pound out a very rough first draft of a novel. The goal is to write 50,000 words by the end of November, which evens out to 1,667 words per day (roughly six pages double spaced). I loved the idea of a month of frantically writing with "reckless abandon," as they say, but it was daunting. You're supposed to start from scratch i.e. you can have notes and that sort of thing, but you can't have written any of the actual text before. So as November 1st zoomed into view, I started to panic. I had the barest of bare bones of an idea that I could start working on completely from scratch, but there was one glaring problem. The story that's been weighing on me most, a story which I began writing for my class last year, was the one I wanted to write. I went back and forth about it, but ultimately decided to be a "rebel" and work on this story (in my defense, I scrapped most of what I had written for it previously anyway). 

So today, with my plot outlines and mess of notes, I began typing away with said reckless abandon on my lunch break. And you know what? Day one's over (1,786 words) and it feels amazing! While I'm told this will soon pass and be replaced with panic, I'm bubbling with a sense of accomplishment. It already feels like my story is evolving the way it should. So since I'm both basking in this triumph and supposed to be using this blog to keep me accountable about my writing, I've added the very scary NaNoWriMo word count monitor on the right. Keep your eye on it and send me encouragement and howlers accordingly. My only question is, why November? I'm worried this will all go out the window once I go home for Thanksgiving break, so I'm determined to try writing more than the minimum whenever I can a.k.a being extra antisocial! Side note: imagine how much more I might have written tonight had The Vampire Diaries not been on! The mind reels.

But all this novel business makes me homesick for France, the source of nearly all my ideas. Some of my greatest adventures, both good and bad, took place there and its influence trickles into most of my writing. This is especially true of setting, which I will gladly attribute to what adds up to weeks spent on trains zooming through the French countryside i.e. my muse. So I can't resist sharing this picture my friend Brita sent me earlier today of the facelifts they're giving the RER trains that run between my favorite places on earth, Paris and Versailles. 

Do you still call it fangirling when it's about a train? (x)

Comme c'est magnifique! I was just there in June, but... I think it's time to go back already! But then, isn't it always? Oh what I'd give to be scribbling away on the RER this very moment!