Starting the Year Over
This maybe a bizarre thing to do this close to the years end as we are in the dying quarter but I feel that so far 2020 has been the year that has not happened but I can’t let it remain that way and so I am starting over – this is my new year – this is my time to do the things I want to do and mainly I want to write and craft and go for walks – that last one is probably going to be the trickiest but none the less it shall be attempted!
So were does this leave me writing wise?
Well prepping for NaNoWriMo – NaNo is a novel writing challenge where the aim is to write a novel in the month of November or at least write 50, 000 words. You can set your own goals as well and I always find it a good way to get myself writing again. I suppose in truth for the last 10 yrs this time of year has always been the starting again and rebirth of the creativeness from the hectic event schedule of the summer months. But this is obviously long form and prose writing and not poetry so why is that even relevant?
It all has to do with the way I work – once I start writing I write loads – lots in all sorts of forms like the ideas for poems are there hiding and only feel confident enough to come out when I am doing other things. So I shall do other things and loop my writing and creating around in a tangle.
There are many such writing and drawing and making challenges as NaNoWriMo – I even run a few myself such as WoPoWriMo which is back in Feb and unsurprisingly was a bit of a flop this year though I did post stuff I wasn’t as pro active as I should have been because I was already pretty ill from seizures and things. But what I did do was still worth it and still resulted in people writing and getting poems published and I was fortunate I had scheduled stuff because that I could just share to keep them going. I myself did no to little writing and that is unheard of and has typified this year.
So what I have done is make a list of all the things I would normally do – all these creative challenges and I am steadily and hapazadly working my way through them because for the first time this year my mind is buzzing and needing to make again.
I am not even really prioritising joining in with the challenges others are currently doing though those are the ones I am sharing on social media.
Having gone through a lean period of no jobs for either of us I am afraid that as soon as my partner got their new job and before they got their first pay packet I was off buying note pads and books and refills. I mean I also had to get stationary for the school term as well as stuff that was provided by the schools now isn’t but still I spent in all honesty too much on new note books – don’t worry I plan to share their beauty with you all.
Once of the important things for me as well is roping others into these insane challenges, so my family is being subjected to gifts of writing materials and I am carving out specific writing times for us. This is a little double edged as the 9 yr old is a little jumpy around still and very loud and needs a lot of help with spelling and mostly still draws their stories but they are still joining in and creating and they normally only do about half an hour though sometimes they get carried away and just keep going. This time is also snack and drink time so works quiet well.
I have been placing caches of writing materials in the places I tend to hang out and using my portable tech a lot to take notes and do research. Mainly I will confess I have been making lists and drawing bubble web things with too many arrows and trying to order my brain and get myself back into the various writingscapes of my imagination. I am conflicted over my main prose project as it is a little too close to the bone with what is happening in the actual world and I am not sure how good it would be for me to write let alone for people to read at the moment but it is a large and complex universe and has other time periods and tales to tell so maybe I just need to shift sideways a bit or maybe as last yr was my 10th NaNo it is time to start a new project?
I don’t know.
From having a complete dearth of poetic writings I have in the last few weeks been composing again. It is slow going and I some of it is I realised just rewrites of stuff I have already written but the process is going again and the poetry train of thought is once again primed and eggar to be off down the tracks no doubt to derail itself on something minor but lets enjoy it whilst we can!
I suppose with all this babbling I should probably stop typing this and go and do some creating – oh and Happy New Creative Year <3
Posted: Tuesday, October 20th, 2020 @ 10:27 am
Categories: Writing Challenges.
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