Let’s try this once more, with the caveat that whatever I write now will be not much like whatever it was I wrote before. Mea culpa for writing when tired and bah-humbuggery in the first place. And so on.
It is now not quite three weeks since I stopped typing, punched the air above my head with both fists, and squeaked ‘yes!’. You’d've thought the entire experience had had time to settle. Actually, all that did happen was certain sections of my brain, the ones used for sustained sentence construction, shut down altogether and I spent two weeks at work explaining that, you know, the thing, anyway, it was, wasn’t it? So I haven’t really had much of a think about the NaNoWriMo achievement. Not until I told myself quite firmly that I needed to write something sensible about it, if only so that I could think about it and work out what I did think about it. [You can see what she means about sentence construction shut-down, can't you? - Ed].
After much ferreting about in the ante-chambers of my subconscious [which was fun. More gin, please] I came up with the following. Make of it what you will.
- The kitchen did not crash through the floor under the weight of unwashed crockery and unlaundered laundry. My husband is a pearl amongst men, and does all the ironing in any case, so this should not necessarily have been an unexpected bonus, but it is nevertheless a little disconcerting to find out how not very vital one is to the running of the household.
- Nevertheless, I am the better cook.
- I am perfectly capable of a sustained creative effort. I just need deadlines and people’s expectations and such. This explains how I came to write a thesis, and had yet to finish a novel. It’s also slightly embarrassing; whatever happened to being a self-motivating grown-up such as the one I insisted I was in my job applications? Anyway, deadlines are not the sucking dry of the pith of creativity at all, and clearly my Muse is a donkey that runs on wallops and a running commentary of emotional blackmail.
- Writing is the cure for just about everything. Plot stalled in the fast-lane, making foolish coughing noises whenever the engine is switched on? Get out and push. Keep writing, even if all you are writing is ‘well, obviously, I need A and B to have a big row here so B can storm out in preparation for the next chapter, but A has no motivation, so what don’t I know about A? Ho hum. My feet are cold.’ It will eventually catch and you’ll be off again, winging down the highway to the end of the chapter. Ditto, if you think your lead character is boring, or you can’t imagine anyone wanting to have sex with him, or you realise on page 78 that character C should have been introduced on page 2. There is nothing morally wrong in writing ‘NB, C at scene of murder,’ in caps and carrying on.
- The Editor will shut up eventually if promised full control of the redrafts and veto on who gets to see the manuscript. [It's my job, woman!]
- I spent many happy hours hiding references to Metaphysical poets in the novel. Good Christ Almighty, what is wrong with me? [I could a tale unfold.. oh, never mind]
- Writing about unrequited lust, incestuous desires, squalid sex between people who don’t like each other much, and riding crops is not only great fun but worryingly easy. [See? Fretful porpentines are the least of it].
- I did promise myself, and insisted to the Editor, that I’d deal with the rewrites after, yes, after Christmas. This has not stopped the novel dancing about in my forebrain these past two weeks, demanding more and better jokes, several new characters, a rearrangement of the sub-plot, and fresh underpants right NOW. Once you’ve started, you can’t stop. To be borne thoroughly in mind.
