Day....Eight of NaNoWriMo...it's a slog

Today I thought; Hmmm...maybe I'll write flash fiction for a while... I think I actually just realized I was writing my second novel.

Word count is 8,184. I 'should' be doing a lot better. I suddenly recall that when I started the first novel, I was a slow writer up until around 30k. This time it seems harder; somehow there's more invested; more emotional attachment to the story, to the way I decided it could be in my outline. More long pauses, staring at the wall or the bookcase, between sentences and paragraphs - even though I know, generally, where I'm going, the actual writing is much deeper than just the setup, the way I imagined the story in fast-forward motion, little mannequins of my characters on the stage. Now they're real and they're right in front of my face, they're demanding that I portray the texture of their lives accurately. They've become something else entirely. I mean, they seem to have skin. It's a little eerie.

Several times today I was exhausted mentally and I had only written 100-200 words. At least I have learned to avoid the whole editing trap, where at the end you have even less words than you started with and things really aren't that different. At least I'm still moving forward, and I should pat myself on the back for that.

I was moaning at my husband last night, and he told me sagely, "Less is more." In general, I agree with that - I know that by thinking more about the sentence before I write it, thinking of another way to phrase something, is making it 'better' - I notice improvement in my rhythm, etc (things that don't come naturally to me). But for November, more is more. I need to hit 50k by November 30 at midnight. I'm going to try to be more free with myself. It was easier when there was no outline; but I'm thinking right now that my outline will help make it better as a whole; more complete from the start. I just hope those 3,000 word days will come soon; I need to stop thinking so much and just let it out! And I need to catch up! Tomorrow, I pledge to myself to write 2,000 words, no matter how long it takes.

Note: backed the story up to Yahoo Briefcase today. Something I should probably do every day.