Trash · Memories

So here I sit, looking at some guaranteed undisturbed wee hours. Pandora rocks my headphones, cranking out Sissy Boy Radio... perfect conditions for writing... But the story is done.

I've finished my little experiment: How to Write 18,000 Words in One Winter Break, or How to Be
a Sort-Of Author in Three Weeks--From Home!

The Rationale: I'm going to be in school for the rest of my life. I am a writer who wants to be published. NaNoWriMo is impossible because November is FINALS, PEOPLE! HELLO?!? Ahem. Sorry. While in school, I have weeks at a time where I'm not working 24 hours a day at stuffing my brain (NOT in November *cough*). I have the option of three months off every year. Writing (well) takes time, hours a day, in fact. I have that time. So.

The Method: During winter and summer breaks, I will work on novel-length pieces, pushing as far forward as possible during the days I have "off." I realize that I will soon be a wife and mother, and soon those "off" days will be filled with all sorts of things that aren't writing. Hell, they already are. But. During winter and summer breaks, I will write diligently on one piece the entire time. Spring break, well, that's going to be our anniversary week, so all writing deadlines can kindly fuck off. Spring breaks are for WOO and nobody can take that away from me.

During the semester, I'll write shorter pieces of fiction, nonfiction, and poetry. I need to feed my brain, but also leave the creative writing field way open. During this past semester, I finished a short story in about two weeks, and I know I can do that again. It wasn't the best short story in the freaking world, but it was solid. Most importantly, it was done. There will be papers and papers and papers to write and eventually to read, so I need to keep my commitments relatively low and my deadlines relatively short. I will probably crank out lots of fluff, and I'm going to forgive myself for that. Dealing with esoteric points of literature and grammar might make me a little crazy, so steam will need to be blown off. On the other hand, school offers me the unique opportunity to research to my heart's content. This semester, I'm taking an ancient history class. Do I really need to say anything else? I mean, really? Has anybody read any fantasy? Besides a class in Medieval history, nothing could be better. Next I want to take something about Westerns or the Victorian era. OK. I digress.

The Nutshell: Winter and summer breaks are for writing like the devil's after me. School sessions are for collecting crazy literary and historical minutiae and then producing short stories and nonfiction and poetry from it.

It's working out pretty well so far.

18,000 words, not to shabby, right? That's 62 pages in MLA format, you know. Maaaaybe... a third? of those words were written in 2004. But I get points for revamping them because that shit is some work. Also, with that estimate, about 12,000 of those words are new. NEW, bitches. NEW. And that's exciting.