NaNoWriMo Day 21

Today, on my 21st day into National Novel Writing Month, I am 28,499 words in—which might sound impressive until I hit the Stats bar on my NaNoWriMo Profile Page: I am 6,501 words behind. My suggested cumulative word count for the beginning of the day was 35,000 words.

It's not from lack of interest or idea on my part; life has gotten in the way. My kid's two full days and two half-days off from school this month, hubby out of town for consecutive weeks, and a half-day visit to the ER with E-girl for a broken arm, has meant that I haven't been able to sit alone and write at the computer for the two or three hours I need every day. Desperate, I have taken to writing paragraphs as multiple text messages on my cell phone or scribbling into a tiny notebook whenever I am sitting waiting anywhere or watching kids at play.

I have guiltily set E-girl in front of the TV on the schools days off, but I just can't put her there for more than an hour and a half. She needs fresh air and friends and interaction.

So I really want to write this book—all this time away from it has made me desperate to put it down, which is a wonderful thing, if you think about it. Without the pressure to finish it within a certain time frame, it might still just be another one of my good ideas I've never made time for. The less I am able to write it, the more urgent it has become for me.