(no subject)
Nov. 1st, 2009 06:46 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
kittydesadeWell, I was having a good night -- nay, a great night -- until about five, fifteen minutes ago maybe until a couple of things happened. Probably fifteen minutes ago by the time I hit post.
I dearly love my intelligence and my sanity being insulted because I choose to participate in an activity. No, really, I do. It's refreshing to know when I'm being judged, and by what standards and criteria. As for what I post or whether or not it's interesting, I do try to LJ cut the very long entries, and your scroll wheel and down arrow are right there.
I've been doing Nanowrimo (yes, this is about Nanowrimo) for... not quite ten years, but almost. I missed the first couple of years, and then I joined in, and it was fun. I like doing it. I certainly don't think it's for everyone. This year I encouraged and enabled a close friend into doing it, and then on the first day she tripped over the fact that a lot of what Nanowrimo is and stands for is just stuff she doesn't do. Which. Aheh. Oops. Mea culpa? She decided not to after all, and I think she'll be better off for it, and I do support her in that. It's clearly not for her. It's clearly (to me) for me.
Why? Because actually finishing a long work, a novel length work, is still something I struggle with. I get to a certain point and I go oh god will this thing never END? and I quit. And Nanowrimo helps me get the discipline to do it. Oddly, Courtesan School has actually helped with that too, but before CS was even a glimmer in me or her or her's eye, there was Nano. I wrote two novels for Nano that were or are to be submitted for publication, one of them almost made it, too. Because of, yes, a stupid marathon thing, I developed the discipline to actually finish the novels I started, and wanted to sell.
I do Nano because it's fun. Yes, stressing out about something can be fun, stop looking at me like I'm a crazy person, please. If stressing out about something wouldn't be fun, we wouldn't enjoy things designed to increase our stress levels. Performing in front of an audience, for example. The sheer amount of stress I've put into that, other people have put into that, that I've seen other people put into that, is amazing. And yet people do it. Because the rush of having completed something that took that much effort is worth it. Because other factors make it worth it.
I do Nano because it gives me a reason, even if I write nothing else all year, to put away the internet and sit ass down and write. Okay, not a reason, but an excuse. There are times when I do go for weeks and don't write anything and I feel bad about myself because of it, but come November? That's mine. And has been for almost ten years.
And lastly but what I feel is probably the most universal and important of reasons, I do Nanowrimo because it's fun. And no, having fun is neither crazy, nor stupid.
If it's not fun for you, don't do it. That's easy.
My Nanonovel Corsair will continue to be posted every day, in small chunks. Same as my German exercises, and my Russian. I'm writing another one that will be posted over at![[livejournal.com profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/external/lj-userinfo.gif)
abit_unsettlin if you want to read. Following Nano, both novels will be up on my web page as soon as my tired little hands can code them in. Thank you to those of you who commented or left feedback in other places, I'm glad you're enjoying this... probably more than I am, to tell the truth, right now. But that's one of the hazards of writing. When it's over I'll re-read and then, given how it's going (and the fact that I was amused by one of my own pieces this morning as it was happening, I love it when that happens) I'm pretty sure I'll be enjoying that, too.
I dearly love my intelligence and my sanity being insulted because I choose to participate in an activity. No, really, I do. It's refreshing to know when I'm being judged, and by what standards and criteria. As for what I post or whether or not it's interesting, I do try to LJ cut the very long entries, and your scroll wheel and down arrow are right there.
I've been doing Nanowrimo (yes, this is about Nanowrimo) for... not quite ten years, but almost. I missed the first couple of years, and then I joined in, and it was fun. I like doing it. I certainly don't think it's for everyone. This year I encouraged and enabled a close friend into doing it, and then on the first day she tripped over the fact that a lot of what Nanowrimo is and stands for is just stuff she doesn't do. Which. Aheh. Oops. Mea culpa? She decided not to after all, and I think she'll be better off for it, and I do support her in that. It's clearly not for her. It's clearly (to me) for me.
Why? Because actually finishing a long work, a novel length work, is still something I struggle with. I get to a certain point and I go oh god will this thing never END? and I quit. And Nanowrimo helps me get the discipline to do it. Oddly, Courtesan School has actually helped with that too, but before CS was even a glimmer in me or her or her's eye, there was Nano. I wrote two novels for Nano that were or are to be submitted for publication, one of them almost made it, too. Because of, yes, a stupid marathon thing, I developed the discipline to actually finish the novels I started, and wanted to sell.
I do Nano because it's fun. Yes, stressing out about something can be fun, stop looking at me like I'm a crazy person, please. If stressing out about something wouldn't be fun, we wouldn't enjoy things designed to increase our stress levels. Performing in front of an audience, for example. The sheer amount of stress I've put into that, other people have put into that, that I've seen other people put into that, is amazing. And yet people do it. Because the rush of having completed something that took that much effort is worth it. Because other factors make it worth it.
I do Nano because it gives me a reason, even if I write nothing else all year, to put away the internet and sit ass down and write. Okay, not a reason, but an excuse. There are times when I do go for weeks and don't write anything and I feel bad about myself because of it, but come November? That's mine. And has been for almost ten years.
And lastly but what I feel is probably the most universal and important of reasons, I do Nanowrimo because it's fun. And no, having fun is neither crazy, nor stupid.
If it's not fun for you, don't do it. That's easy.
My Nanonovel Corsair will continue to be posted every day, in small chunks. Same as my German exercises, and my Russian. I'm writing another one that will be posted over at
abit_unsettlin if you want to read. Following Nano, both novels will be up on my web page as soon as my tired little hands can code them in. Thank you to those of you who commented or left feedback in other places, I'm glad you're enjoying this... probably more than I am, to tell the truth, right now. But that's one of the hazards of writing. When it's over I'll re-read and then, given how it's going (and the fact that I was amused by one of my own pieces this morning as it was happening, I love it when that happens) I'm pretty sure I'll be enjoying that, too.