My First NaNoWriMo – A Tale of Healing!

National Novel Writing Month healed me.

If you ask the Dayton, Ohio, NaNo group, those who know me likely consider me a prolific writer.  I can hammer out seven hundred words in a fifteen-minute word war and have little problem writing fifty thousand words in less than three weeks.  I'm focused and intense, man!

But I didn't always live in Dayton.  For the previous three years before my first NaNo, I lived in Miami, Florida.  It was the most consistently miserable time in my adult life.  I felt trapped, I didn't have many friends, I didn't want to go anywhere.  While I was in Miami, I finished a couple of short stories, but that's all.  Prolific?  Pshaw.  I'd be lucky to write at all in the course of a month.  I was seriously concerned that I had lost the ability to write, lost the magic that allowed me to express myself in words, and was trying to adjust to the idea that I wasn't a writer, after all.  It was a rough adjustment because I didn't want to make it.  I loved writing.  It had defined me as a person since I was a kid!  Since almost before I can remember, I wanted to be a writer, and I have worked to hone my craft.  For those three years, I was in and out of dark moods brought on by my inability to write, and when I did it was dark stuff indeed.

Then, Ohio.  I didn't know anyone and went to a NaNo kickoff party.  I sat there awkwardly, not knowing what to do, really, other than write.  But before the end of the kickoff party, I had been invited to an afterparty.  Many of the people that were at that initial meeting became lasting friends.

Even better, I could write.  The floodgates were open.  After three years of almost no productivity, I wrote seventy-five thousand words in a month.  The magic was back as if it had never gone, or even had grown stronger in its time away.

NaNoWriMo restored me to myself.  The fears that I wasn't a writer evaporated in the warmth that the people there gave me, without being asked for it, without even knowing they were doing it.  I will always love NaNo and the alchemy of experience that brought my art back to life.

Kit Bradley
NaNoWriMo name: swordandlion
2016 NaNo Project: editing Lord Goblin novels
http://kitbradley.net/



Comments

  1. Darla M SandsNovember 21, 2016 at 8:13 AM

    I'm so happy you rediscovered your talent. Thank you for sharing your story. And happy writing!

    ReplyDelete
  2. Rochelle BradleyNovember 21, 2016 at 10:07 AM

    So glad you came to that kick-off party! The community of Nanowrimo is a welcoming and safe place. Love our #DaytonWrimos, they're are an awesome & fun bunch. Thank you for sharing and for having Tippy's back.

    ReplyDelete

Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

Sci-Fi + Hot Air Balloons = Steampunk

Image
I’m a Municipal Liaison for the Dayton, Ohio region for NaNoWriMo.  I have been participating in since 2012, and while I do try to participate in Camp NanoWriMo I am far more successful in November. The pressure and the rigorous pace suit me.  Many people hear “50,000 words in 30 days” and get nervous or scared. But if it wasn’t a challenge it wouldn’t be worth doing, in my opinion. Writing buddy Oberon... a cute distraction. Normally for NaNoWriMo , I write an urban fantasy series starring the Four Horsemen of the Apocalypse. Their story has never come together in a way that’s satisfactory for me, though I love the characters.  This year I’ll be venturing into a different genre: Steampunk. How I came to my story was a little different than in past years. Usually, I get my ideas from things I see in real life, and then giving them a supernatural twist. But this time, I was inspired by a flash fiction prompt I received for a contest by NYC Midnight .  I was given t
Read more

Don't Be Lonely

Image
Writing can be lonely. Let's face it, it's a solitary activity. If you feel isolated, here are some suggestions. This time last year I was truly TheNoviceWriter  but over the course of twelve months I've had many other novice writers ask me questions about writing. I found I could not only answer but offer advice based on my experiences in 2014. #1: Join a writing group. Once a week, once a month or even once a year meet with others who share your passion. You can find these groups on Meetup or other social media sites like Facebook. Enter your location and your interest and voila! You'll have a list to choose from. Your local library might offer writing clinics or clubs. National Novel Writing Month  is a event that happens every November. You have a chance to connect to other writers in your area on the forums but they also host "write-ins" at local coffee shops like Panera. It's a great time to meet other writers, experienced, published or novic
Read more

NaNoWriMo Tips from the Muse

Image
Happy 2016 NaNoWriMo season! I’m Kelly Blanchard, known online as the Muse, but on the NaNo site, I’m as Kellannetta, and this is my ninth year to participate in NaNo. This year I’m co-writing a fantasy novel with my boyfriend, which we have temporarily titled ‘The King’s Hand’. Since we’re co-writing, we technically need to write 100,000 words so we will have 50,000 words between the two of us, but we will see what happens! A year before I joined, my mother discovered the NaNoWriMo challenge, and she participated in it. At that time, I was struggling to regain my confidence in writing because I had gone through a breakup. The following year, I had finally established my writing habits and tried the challenge. I haven’t stopped yet, and I’ve won every year. If you’re new to NaNo, here are some tricks I’ve picked up along the way. First, in order to achieve 50,000 words a day in 30 days, you need to write at least 1,667 words every day. However, that is such an odd number,
Read more