This year I sat down before my keyboard for nearly thirty days, typing away and wearing the letters off a good few of my keys (seriously). I stayed up well into the night, forgoing sleep from time to time because even when my fingers weren’t moving my brain still was and wouldn’t let me rest. I organized write-ins, told friends and family, and then pushed my self to the limits and beyond.

As a result I have the most wonderful news possible, the greatest achievement in my young life.

I wrote a novel.

For a total of 168,635 words, 600 some odd pages, 3000 some odd paragraphs, sweat, tears, and love.

Kat’s Tail was completed Thanksgiving night. :) We went to Red Lobster today to celebrate.

Yes, it really is morning. Usually I go to bed around six am (because I’m a night shift kind of girl) but tonight I wrote and wrote and wrote until my poor little fingers were so tired and my brain just couldn’t function anymore and I took a fifteen minute nap, then I woke up, turned the laptop back on and decided I was ready for round two. It’s nine in the morning and I still haven’t been to bed and I feel wonderful!

It’s amazing what a good mood can do for you mixed together with lack of sleep and the joy of reaching 127,357 words AND knowing you only have two or three chapters left till the story is actually finished, completed, ended, [inserts other words for 'oh, my gods, I'm almost done!' here].

It’s such a pretty thought, so shiny and tempting that I have no clue what to do with it but run around in circles right now. I was telling my husband last night that I really, honestly, believe I might cry when I finish the book. It’s not an if anymore, it’s a when. I don’t think I’ve ever been able to say that about one of my longer pieces since I happen to suffer from a chronic case of ADOSSO.

Attention Deficit… Oh, shit! Shiny object! Pardon the curse, lol, it’s something Kei and I came up with together while attempting to get up early the next day after staying up till noon writing (to clarify: we woke up, started writing, and didn’t go to sleep till lunch time the next day) and we were feeling rather goofy and random. To be honest I don’t know why people need drugs, if they’d just deprive themselves of sleep doing something they love, deprive a good friend along with them, then force each other into consciousness the next day they’d be whacked out all the time. I mean, given I’m bound to be cranky when I first wake up but while I’m trying to fall back asleep it’s like the little net that catches all the things I don’t mean to say while I’m awake is damaged. Even better- because of my lack of sleep and recent visit to dreamland my motor skills are generally suffering and sometimes saying a word with more than two syllables is a bit of a challenge… so yeah, I don’t need drugs. I’m weird enough as is.

Anyways back to topic…

Wait.

I had a topic?

Hmm.

Oh yes, finishing my novel. I can no call it a novel without thinking I’m stealing some catch phrase because even at size twelve font I’m numbering at over 500 pages right now. I know I’d be wasting trees if I did it but the urge to print it out when I’m all done just so I can hug the bulk of it is tremendous. Fortunately my husband has talked me into waiting until it’s gone through at least the first edit and then using the ‘CreateSpace’ offer from the NaNo to get a single bound copy for myself and then I can merrily accuse them of killing of innocent trees just so I can hug my novel.

I can hardly believe that the month isn’t even over yet (though I’m glad it’s not), it just seems like this has been the longest month of my entire life. Even thinking back to last years NaNo, it was nothing like this for me. I mean it was still crazy, awesome, inspiring, and finger numbingly wonderful but there is a definite difference. See, last year I used the NaNo as a means of forcing myself back into the writing world. When afraid to walk down the stairs go jump off a cliff so to speak to prove it’ll only hurt if… hmm…. that analogy was in my head and then as I was typing it I lost my train of thought and I can’t remember when I was going.

So, yeah, last year was a reintroduction into what I love, this year I’ve already been baptised so to speak and I’m no longer testing the waters but jumping in and swimming like a fish. I live and breath writing. :) I think it also helps having another writer in the house to compete with, it’s in my nature to try and type faster and hit the word counts faster if I can and if I can’t it gives me something to aim for like a mini game amongst the great challenge.

Even more so was all the encouragement my wonderful Husband keeps giving and his patience in my antics every thirty minutes or so when I busted another thousand out and had to tell him all about it. Both my brothers even helped push me along though I’m not sure they know it. I’ve been posting my latest and greatest word counts on my instant messenger the entire time and little did I know till recently that they were both following along and it surprised me when now and then they’d leave me a little message to go for it and such. It’s kind of cool how even though they don’t get along, or even talk, to each other how they can come together for me on this one thing. It makes smile.

Now for a random page from 365 Tao

“Do your devotions make you happy?
Is your life a joyous song?”

~Deng Ming-Dao

On this page Deng mentions while speaking of spiritual devotion that “it is unfortunate that so much coercion, unhappiness, bitterness, guilt, and fear become wrapped up in spirituality.” He goes on to talk about how being devoted to whatever you consider spiritual in your life, the thing you live for, or whatever churns your soul- it should make you happy and that it should be a celebration not a grudging ritual and I wholeheartedly agree. It’s difficult to explain without typing down what he said here and as my glasses are missing and I’m doing what quoting I am doing most from my head- you’ll just have to settle with my poor explanation.

When I read this earlier, this random page I turned to in a moment of contemplation I had a thought surface brightly in my head like the sun dancing up over the horizon. I wouldn’t call it a strange thought, it has occurred to me more than once but I don’t think it’s a common thought and I’m alright with that.

Writing is my spirituality.

I like to say that I do not have a religion, religion is for those who can name the faith they belong and can read out of the same book as millions of others without knowing the history behind it and follow it- not blindly but more like a sheep follows a flock. I’m not speaking of any one religion just organized religion in general.

To me spirituality is how you express your deepest soul felt feelings, it’s the guidelines you set for yourself, and your point of view in how the universe works. Spirituality is like a snowflake, no two for any two people are alike. Similar maybe but the same? Never because we are all different with different souls that have different needs but I’m ranting so I’ll pull myself back in the direction I was going beforehand.

Writing is my spirituality.

Everything that comes into my soul, my head, my heart. I express it through writing. The universe gives me all these wonders and I give back by writing. I celebrate my life and my happiness or the flip side of the same coin by writing.

Some Tibetan monk goes to his temple every single day, he adorns his robes, and purifies himself.

I sit before the temple of my laptop or notebook every single day, I build my writers nest out of all my favorite blankets, and I clear my mind.

The monk puts his hands together to pray.

I spread my fingers out over the keyboard.

The monk may sings hymns of the joy that his beliefs have brought him.

I dance spontaneously every ten pages.

He will sweep his temple steps in reverence to his place of practice.

I will meticulously pull all the keys off my keyboard and pick out all the cat hair and possibly Chinese food that has fallen beneath them because it is my place of practice and I revere it.

He will sit in silence for hours listening as his god speaks to him through it.

I will listen to my mp3 player for hours listening as random ideas pop into my head with convenient lyrics.

His god will bring him the greatest wisdom he has ever known if he listens with a full heart and an open soul.

My characters will bring me the greatest stories and teach me the greatest morals I have ever known, taking me on adventures I may have never had otherwise through my stories if I listen with a full heart and an open soul.

*grin*

—-

I’m still recovering from this week but I think I have just enough energy to trip through an updated post but before I do I just wanted to let you all know that I updated comments. :) Took me a bit since there are so many of you wonderful people out there but I got it done. Also, I should warn you that the thing I usually use to write my posts is acting wonky so these may or may not be spell checked.

There are a lot of thoughts in my mind right now, neither good nor bad mostly. They’re just there, swimming around more freely than I’ve ever let them swim before. Usually I keep certain thoughts tangled in protective webs but lately I’ve been feeling pretty brave towards some of these. It just sort of happened.

Hmm… feeling random.

So, yeah, 50,000 words the other night. 50 thousand in merely seven day. I think I’m rather proud of myself right now, still very tired but it feels great to be tired and have something to show for it which is more than I can say most days.

Pulling away from writing for a moment on that thought- It’s so amazing, right now I can feel my life happening. I feel busy when I look at the week ahead (every and any week) but yet I feel content as I go through the motions. Sometimes it doesn’t feel like I’m getting anywhere with my housework, my job, or just life in general but yet I can ‘feel’ my life moving all around me and it’s the most beautiful thing ever. I can see the constant changes around me like I’m part of this entity that keeps breathing in and out, or a sea as the tides come forth and fall back again. It’s a rythm but never the same twice in a row.

There was once a time in my life when I didn’t see these things, given, most of us don’t pay considerable attention ‘to’ change just the changes that are currently affecting them but I think I have been given a way or a reason to see this… feeling (if that makes sense) a little clearer than a lot of people.

I remember when I first left my mother’s home, I had to be about 15, and moved in with some friends. My mother can’t help the way she is, she has problems but that wasn’t the only reason I needed to leave though usually when I bring this topic up it’s the only one I talk about. It was a stagnant place filled with negativity and constantly changing rules. I was left on my own more often than not and probably spoke less than ten minutes all together out of any given day if I spoke at all. I wasn’t around people a lot unless we had them over and then they usually left with her and went to the bar.

Spending so much time on my own you’d think I would have been left to my thoughts but I wasn’t. I didn’t really think about anything except for the occasional story. My only thoughts, when I chose to have them, were always negatively directed at myself because when I was spoken to those were often the only things I heard.

I didn’t really have anything to get excited about and I didn’t cry unless my mother lost her temper. I didn’t get angry and up until the end I didn’t talk back. I didn’t emote at all unless I was afraid of getting in trouble for anything.

And I never realized any of this.

Think about it, if you had never been exposed to the color red in your entire life would you imagine things in that color? When you see it for the first time would you know what was going on or what to call it?

After and even a little bit before I left when I started being exposed more and more to other people, families, and was starting to engage in conversations and being asked what was on my mind something started to change. I thought there was something was wrong with me at first and I spent a lot of time crying but the more and more I was exposed to these outside influences I’d never had before I started to have all these different feelings I hadn’t felt before.

When the people who later became my adoptive family started asking me what I thought about this and that I started to think more. Did you know I never knew what my favorite color was until someone asked me? Seriously, the same thing goes with favorite music, food, style of cloths, and even what gender I preferred to date.

When I started thinking was when my mother and I hit the worst period. I stayed up at night thinking of all the things that happened between the two of us and examining the feelings she expressed, a really strange thing for a 15 year old to consciously do. I thought about what I thought about what she did! And needless to say I didn’t like the feelings that came with it. I started expressing myself more and more and it led up to a breaking point.

Getting back to my point before I fall into ranting mode: I never had change in my life before (unless you count moving and meeting mother’s new boyfriends), never had too many conscious thoughts, never felt so many things before- emotions I still have trouble giving words to even now. Because of all this I think I’m better able to see these things around me and it’s like a gift. Like interest for all those years I missed out on, now when I see the world I see it so vibrantly that it was worth the few years I couldn’t comprehend.

It still gives me trouble from time to time, I don’t adapt to change very well but I’m starting to get braver. Starting to see that not all change will hurt me and that the sudden appearance of something bad (like reappearing relatives) doesn’t always mean my entire world is going to fall apart. I’m still afraid sometimes and my emotions and thoughts still confuse me but it’s alright because I love learning and this means that I’ll never be done. ;)

I think if I continue at this rate for NaNo (since I am still writing) I could have another 50 thousand out around the 14th, and continuing at this pace till the end of the month I am very capable of reaching 200 thousand if I put my mind to it. We’ll see though, I think I’m only going to aim for 150 because my book might be close to done about then.

I really feel like I’m making progress on my novel for once. I mean, I have made progress n other stories before and I have felt it but this one feels so different. It was amazing when the idea came to me, the thing practically wrote itself in a matter of days (I speak of a rough outline spanning half a notebook) and this was by hand too because I didn’t even have enough patience for the laptop and typing I just had to pen it, my soul thirsting for the ink upon the pages.

Now though, the story is really on the move. I can feel the the tension building, the drama spinning out of control, and the climax- though I am far from it, I can see it way up ahead on the mountain top that I find myself climbing towards. My goal is in sight- far, but in sight and that’s more than I’ve ever dared to ask for.

I would really like to see it published some day but if I never get there (and trust me when I say I’m amazed I’m typing this) I think I’ll be okay. It’d be great but I just want to write a great story. I can share it without having it bound and contracted by some company though I more likely to make money which would give me ‘more’ free time to write but… if it never does I’ll just share it in my own little way. :)

Time to sleep.

I’m reading all your comments even if I haven’t approved them to the site yet, that’s just how I keep track of the ones I need to respond to.

Night.

PS. Spammers suck and ‘whatsyourname’, you know who you are, I pity you for not having anything better to do with your time. Go play in traffic.

Oh. My. Gosh.

I did it!

In less than a week!

I just finished my 50,000 words…

I’ll catch up on comments tomorrow this calls for a celebration and I think I know just what I want to do.

Sleep.