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Seems a little backward, doesn’t it? It’s supposed to be quality not quantity… But that’s the idea behind NaNoWriMo and I think it applies to Polymer Clay or any other creative activity.

Saturday is the first day of National Novel Writing Month. The idea is to write 50,000 words in one month. I was reading a book by the founder Chris Baty (No Plot, No Problem) which described the concept.

Basically, the idea is to have a deadline and the support of other people doing the same project and to write so much and so regularly that you get past your Inner Editor which makes you procrastinate and second guess yourself. The idea is to just write without worrying about it, to have some fun and prove that you can accomplish something. And he makes the point that it’s often not any worse than a normal first draft that you spent hours agonizing over every sentence.

I think the same thing can apply to art. I don’t remember whose blog had the anecdote but it talked about an experiment with a ceramics class. One half of the class was told they would be graded on one piece. They had all semester to make that perfect piece and they agonized over it. The other half of the class was told quality didn’t matter. They were going to be graded on how many pieces they produced. So, they started whipping out as many pieces as they could. At the end of the semester, their pieces were better even though they hadn’t put any thought into quality.

And that’s the idea behind NaNoWriMo. Quality comes about after quantity, and relaxing a bit about the importance of it all.

Have you ever heard of NaNoWriMo?

November is National Novel Writing Month (NaNoWriMo). Sign up on the site, write 50,000 words in 30 days and you’re a winner.

No worrying about how good it is, no going back to edit… The idea is to write as much as you can for as long as you can, and free your mind of whimsey. *imagine the last words in the appropriate wise sensei voice*

Actually, it’s more like consign your mind to insanity. AI’m not sure if it’s more insane to voluntarily sign up for this kind of self torture, or to allow your over-tired brain to take over your fingers and your keyboard. It will be interesting to see what happens.

Either way, I’m going to try it this year. I’m really not sure if I can get to 50,000 words in one month. That’s an awful lot of words for me. But I’m going to try. However much I write, it will be more than I had before.

And it ought to be fun In a crazy, twisted sort of way…

It was a dark and stormy night is one of the most famous, cliches of an opening line around. (Although, I admit I had to Google the original source - check out the wikipedia article if you’re interested)

But I thought I’d have some fun with it and do a few variations on the theme as a writing exercise.

It was a dark and stormy night–well ok, it wasn’t all that dark, just twilight really, and it was more of a drizzle than a storm–but still it was pretty scary when my Great Aunt Matilda showed up at the door. The drizzle had collected in little droplets which highlighted the three hairs protruding from the mole on her cheek.

It was a dark and stormy night, as dark as his enemy’s heart and as stormy as his thoughts, when he loaded the pistol and tucked it into his coat pocket.

It was a dark and stormy night, just perfect for puddle jumping with a flashlight. Of course, mother wasn’t too happy when we all trooped in to the kitchen and the mud ran down our slickers and smeared the prints already made by our galoshes.

It was a dark and stormy night when the aliens showed up the first time. They’d been reading our books and watching our movies, you see, and they knowed exactly how to do it. They even mocked up a no-kidding, gen-you-wine flying saucer just to impress us yokels. Didn’t work though. You see, Jed was out coon hunting that night and he come across them before they could stage the whole scene. You should just hear him tell the story…

As always when I start something new, I do a ton of learning and research (sounds boring but it’s not). I found some really great articles on writing at Holly Lisle’s site. I bought a couple of her e-book courses and found them really helpful and she has a blog and free newsletter as well. Well worth checking out if you’re interested in writing.

For one thing, it confirmed something I’d finally realized. Don’t edit until you get to the end. The first 16,000 words of my story took me five years or so to write, off and on as I got discouraged and re-enthused.

The problem was, every time I had a good idea or realized I needed to change something, I’d start at the beginning and edit through again until I got back to where I thought of the new idea. And of course by that time, I’d have thought of something else. So, I’d start all over…

Obviously, I didn’t make much progress.

So as I figured out, and Holly reiterated, I made much better progress by simply making a note of that new idea or change, and simply writing on as though I’d already made the change in the earlier pages. After all, I’ve done the last 30,000 words in the last few months. Still not prolific by most writers standards but quite a bit better than I had been doing.

So what have I been up to?

I’ve been writing. I have 45,000+ words and about 10 chapters done on a YA fantasy story. I have the story complete to the end actually but after chapter 10 it goes from rough draft to notations like **add more conflict with the dragon here**. I’m getting there though and I’m really enjoying it. It’s lighthearted and fun and I have two more books that I have in mind after it.

The working title is The Middle Princess, but I’m dithering between that and The Practical Princess, or just Hyacinth, or anything else that comes along that sounds like a better idea. (Opinions welcome) After all, it has to fit in with the other two stories I’m planning to write about her older and younger sister - Forsythia and Chrysanthemum.

Here’s a portion of the first chapter: (critiques welcome - this is a draft)

CHAPTER 1

“Drat!” said Hyacinth. “She’s brought home another one.”

She stood in the castle doorway and frowned at her younger sister. Princess Chrysanthemum’s noble white steed tossed his head and her golden armor flashed in the midday sun, sending motes of light around the courtyard–and into Hyacinth’s eyes.

But it was Chrysanthemum’s prize that caused the most fuss.

Chrysanthemum struck a pose with her sword held high. “I have conquered the Scourge of Edinrood!”

The noise of her approach had brought everyone–the kitchen staff, the King and Queen, the stable boys, even the King’s chief advisor in a half buttoned waistcoat–out to see what was going on. They all clapped and the kitchen boy cheered as he waved his soup ladle in the air.

“Yes,” Hyacinth snapped. She stepped outside and scowled at the conquered Scourge, “That’s all very well. Now what are you going to do with it?”

The large green dragon stomped heavily at the end of a chain attached to Chrysanthemum’s saddle. A muffled roar and clouds of smoke emerged from the dragon’s tightly muzzled jaws. He shifted back and forth, claws ticking on the cobbles.

Hyacinth put her hands on her hips. “You already have three dragons eating their heads off in the stables. Do you have any idea how hard it is to find flame resistant straw? I have to send clear off to RumpelStiltska for it!”

Chrysanthemum dismounted with a flourish and waved airily at the dragon. “Don’t worry so much, sister dear. He’ll be no trouble at all.” She strode past her sister into the castle, her armor clinking with every step. A babble of admiring voices followed her, they pushed past Hyacinth and begged to hear the latest adventure.

“No trouble for you.” Hyacinth muttered. A muffled “HHHRRMMPPHH!” and rattling chains brought her attention back to the dragon. The beast balanced on haunches and tail, and clawed with his front feet at his leather muzzle. The noble steed’s eyes rolled, flashing white around the edges, and he backed away, pulling the chain taut.

Hyacinth looked around–nobody to be seen. “There’s never a stable hand around when you need one.” She sighed and stepped up to the white charger’s head. “Oh, come on then.” She led the horse towards the stables; the dragon dropped to all fours as the chain on his head drew taut, and he trudged along behind.

She stopped in front of the stable, unfastened the dragon’s chain from the saddle, and wrapped it loosely around one of the hitching posts. “You, SIT. Stay.”

The dragon gave a startled snort and to his own surprise sat down with a “WHUMP”.

“That’s a good dragon.”

I seem to get enthusiasms - I’m not sure what else to call them-where all of a sudden I have a new interest that I have to learn all about. And then I’ll go into overload mode where I absorb everything about the subject that I can find and I’ll try it until I’m relatively confident about it… Then I’ll go on to the next one or cycle back to a new phase of one of my other hobbies. I can’t seem to fully concentrate on more than one thing at a time.

Right now I’m reading up on writing. It was the one thing that I’ve been meaning to get around to “someday” that I hadn’t done much about. So I’ve been writing and I’ve been reading. I always read but it’s is a bit more directed when I’m trying to learn about something. I request books from the library, download workshops, read online articles, listen to podcasts… Basically fill up my brain with anything about the subject I can find.

My brain’s almost at the overflow point - that’s when I can take all these ideas and techniques and know-how and start connecting them together and trying new things.

It’s quite fun actually but I have to admit I’ve been neglecting my clay… But that’s ok. It’s time will come around again once the writing is more stable.

Miyoko San

Snare me the soul of a dragon-fly,
The jewelled heart of a dew-tipped spray,
    A star’s quick eye,
    Or the scarlet cry
Of a lonely wing on a dawn-lit bay.
  Then add the gleam of a golden fan,
  And I will paint you Miyoko San.

Find me the thought of a rose, at sight
Of her own pale face in a fawning stream,
    The polished night
    Of a crow’s slow flight,
And the long, sweet grace of a willow’s dream.
  Then add the droop of a golden fan,
  And I will paint you Miyoko San.

Lure me a lay from a sunbeam’s throat,
The chant of bees in a perfumed lair,
    Or a single note
    Gone mad to float
To its own sweet death in the upper air.
  Then add the click of a golden fan,
  And I have painted Miyoko San.

–Mary McNeil Fenollosa

The Road Not Taken

Two roads diverged in a yellow wood,
And sorry I could not travel both
And be one traveler, long I stood
And looked down one as far as I could
To where it bent in the undergrowth;

Then took the other, as just as fair,
And having perhaps the better claim,
Because it was grassy and wanted wear;
Though as for that the passing there
Had worn them really about the same,

And both that morning equally lay
In leaves no step had trodden black.
Oh, I kept the first for another day!
Yet knowing how way leads on to way,
I doubted if I should ever come back.

I shall be telling this with a sigh
Somewhere ages and ages hence:
Two roads diverged in a wood, and I–
I took the one less traveled by,
And that has made all the difference.

Robert Frost

http://www.bartleby.com/119/1.html

I was walking in the woods a couple weeks ago, around the loop that goes through the nature preserve–the same loop I’ve done many times before. Sometimes I go one way and sometimes I go the other but it’s always the same loop. It’s a nice little place, a hidden green world in the back of a very proper housing development. Looking at the slope of the land, and the enormous rocks left by ancient glaciers I can see why they didn’t build here.

This particular day, I took a small offshoot to the main loop. I’d been that way before, it doesn’t go very far, just down to a stream where the old beam bridge had been cut away because it was unsafe and the preserve doesn’t continue on the other side. I knew where it went. But that day, I noticed something, just the tiny hint of other feet wearing a path–not quite a trail at all–going off along the stream.

And I followed it.

As I came up over the rise a medium sized brown shape scuttled away, into the water or along the bank, I’m not sure. I saw a swampy pond, ghostly drowned trees sticking out of it and blackbirds crying the alarm over head. I startled a pair of mallards and then a great blue heron took off, landing further down the shore.

I sat there for quite awhile, watching the blackbirds and listening to the woodpecker in an old dead pine. Then I followed the bank for awhile, got my shoes muddy and saw a goose sitting quiet, almost dead, on a rock in the middle of the pond. I came back another day, just to be sure she wasn’t dead–she was that still. She had moved on her nest but was still faithfully keeping her eggs warm.

I had a wonderful afternoon that day and spent another hour wandering the woods and exploring, making my own path wherever I wanted to go.