Yeah, I know. It’s been awhile.
But don’t worry…I’ve not fallen by the wayside. Not too far, anyway.
I should start this by saying out loud that I had no intention of doing anything like a NANOWRIMO. I was in the middle of this science fiction thing, you see? That science fiction thing I’ve been wrangling for a couple months now and was just maybe-kinda getting to the point with where I was ready to have that break-through that was going to get me to the end. I had no _need_ for another project. No interest. No. None. no NANOWRIMO for me, thank you.
And then came November 10, and I started looking at a baseball sim league.
[ Aside ]: for the uninitiated, a baseball sim league is a computer simulation of baseball wherein totally real human beings run totally fake teams of totally fake players. This is not to be confused with Fantasy baseball, wherein a bunch of totally fake humans create totally fake teams out of totally real players. [ /Aside ]
I love baseball sims, and this one was really interesting–a group of guys and a fake construct that included a “replacement” US major league system with a Japanese wing, and baseball in Mexico, San Juan, and the Dominican Republic. That was interesting as all get-out.
And then …
There’s this writing component to being part of that league. And, well, I got an idea about a tour of the ball parks in it…I got to thinking about how a kid getting out of school with nothing to do might find his way from park-to-park, he might have a buddy and together they might get into a little trouble
here and a little trouble there, and they might … I wrote it down. Words began to flow in ways I couldn’t stop. Wouldn’t want to if I tried.
And so …
It’s 18 days later and I’ve got about 30K words down and there are maybe another 15 or 20K to go. Yeah, I know that’s small for a novel. Screw it. It is what it is. Maybe it’ll be a little bigger in second draft, maybe not. It’s a baseball story, natch. And it’s got a bit of travelogue, with a bit of Thelma and Louise, a shake of On the Road, a flavor of Field of Dreams, and maybe even a hint of the Sopranos. Who can tell right now? It’s baseball, right?
All I can say for sure is that I’m having a blast and that words are rolling from the moment I sit down until the moment I pry my fingers off the keyboard. It’s a wave, you see. A wave of words. And, baby, I’mma so gonna ride it.
I’m so with you on this, Ron. I never intentionally set out to do NANOWRIMO (because I pride myself on not being a joiner), but something about mid-to-late October tends to find me with a novel project in mind. I’ve always been romantically inclined towards the idea of hibernating with a project through the winter and emerging in the spring with a completed text. Don’t know why. It’s just how my writing mind operates.
I’ve done 90k words in November, plan to have the first draft by Xmas and then spend January and February in that coldly glaring at the pile of crap and its failures/revising stage I like to call editing.
Good luck on the edit, Darren. It’s always interesting to see the different way writers do their thing.