NaNoWriMo Woes

I think I've used this title before, so please forgive me.

I'm not going to edit this blog before posting it, so please forgive me twice.

Anyway,

let's get down to it. I'm both excited and nervous about November and the excited reasons are the same as always, and the nervous reasons are the same as always, except for one. And that reason is I haven't written since April.

But the real reason is I haven't written since my dad died.

I've written in my journal, yes. But even those entries were purposeful and forced and painful. I went from writing three times a month or more, as a form of relaxation, to get my inspiration out, to chronicle my life... to writing maybe once a month if I can coax myself into it. It used to be easy, settling, peaceful. Then April happened.

So I'm nervous. I'm nervous that writing fiction will be just as forced and just as painful. I'm worried that something I love has become irrevocably something I hate. But I'm also hopeful. I'm hopeful that NaNoWriMo will get me back into the routine of writing. Because writing was a routine. It was an enjoyable, albeit effort-full routine. I'm hopeful I'll fall in love with writing all over again. Because right now, it's something scary, something fanged and dark, something I keep hidden under my bed (no really, all my notebooks are banished to the dusty underside of my mattress).

Well...

They say that writing is all about using pain as inspiration. So I guess it's time to face the pain.