Winner! Look ------------->

I WON.

I am so proud of myself!  Writing 50,000 words in one month is a huge and difficult goal, and I did it!  Not only that, but I have rediscovered my love of writing, and I am positively JOYFUL.

My novel isn't finished at 50,000 words and I can't wait to finish it.  I have stumbled through this, having no idea at all how to write a novel.  I've figured a few things out along the way, I think.  I will be thrilled to finish my first draft, which will be a pretty big mess, and then go to work on the second draft, which will be awesome. 

I hit 50,000 words on Sunday night, and called my husband over to the computer to watch the NaNo site verify my win and give me a winner's certificate.  Then we celebrated with champagne and Chinese take-out.

I WON!

Happy Thanksgiving

Tomorrow my husband and I will go eat turkey and stuffing at his father's house, with his stepmother and his sisters and their families.  I only have to make a couple of pumpkin pies for us to take, so I'm getting off relatively easy.

NaNoWriMo is going great!  As of today I am exactly on schedule, as far as how many words I need to have written, and I broke 40,000.  The thing is, I won't be at the end of my novel when I get to 50,000 (which hopefully I will do by next Monday).

I am starting to really fall in love with my characters.  I am way behind on listening to podcasts as I normally do on my long daily commute, all I want to to is listen to Lily Allen and Adele and daydream about what's going to happen next in my novel.  Yesterday I was working on a fairly emotional scene, and I got so caught up in it I had trouble eating.

I still feel like the actual writing itself is not very good.  That's during the times where I am not completely convinced it's the best thing anybody has ever written.  It's been a dramatic month, at least, in my head.  :)

I am thankful for NaNoWriMo, and I'm thankful for my husband being so supportive and picking up all the slack with household chores that I haven't had time to do, and reading what I write every day, and telling me I'm awesome.

Happy Thanksgiving!

NaNoWriMo week 2

Ack!  I'm behind, I'm behind!

This week has been challenging.  I hit some kind of terrible invisible wall of nothingness, up against which my brain would not function.  Words?  What are words?

Arg.  I've been trying not to get too obsessed with my word count, but it's hard.  And did I mention?  I'm behind!

I put up a little word counter thingie over on the right hand side, so you can see exactly how bad or how good I am doing.  It updates each time I update my word count.  If -- WHEN -- I do make it to 50,000 words by midnight on November 30, the little "participant" will turn into "winner".

I have to stop writing this and go write that!

:)

NaNoWriMo

Day One (Sunday) = I have the day off, so it's easier to fit in time to write.  I write furiously and quickly, thrilled to be starting.  I am clever and funny, and my characters are interesting.  Minimum number of words to stay on track: 1,667.  I write 2,766 and feel invincible.

Day Two (Monday) = Back to work, I have to fit in writing afterwards, during time I'd normally spend cleaning the kitchen and watching tv.  I am not in the mood to write, but I do it anyway, because I HAVE TO, that's the whole point.  I don't like what I've written.  Goal number of words today: 3,334 total.  I've written 3,837.  I'm proud of myself for doing something.

Day Three (Tuesday) = What the hell am I doing?  Everything I've written so far is terrible!  I realize that, even though I've spent my whole life reading books and even have a degree in Journalism, I have NO IDEA how to write a novel.  Goal:  5,001 words total.  I somehow make it to 5,274, determined to keep going.

Day Four (Wednesday) = I look desperately at books by Wally Lamb, Jennifer Crusie, Sue Grafton and Andrew Vachss.  I realize I have been plowing through using only action and dialogue, and have described nothing.  Everything I have written so far really IS wrong.  I go back and add descriptions to what I've already written.  Goal: 6,668.   I'm now up to 6935 words total, just by adding basic description that I had stupidly forgotten about before.  I'm a moron.

Day Five (Thursday) = Okay, maybe I am at least going in the right direction, even if I still feel mighty floundery.  I write a couple of small scenes where nothing much happens, and yell at my inner critic who keeps trying to convince me that it's not okay to write scenes that are not big and dramatic.  I write about my main character having a conversation with a co-worker on a break, and about her trying on new clothes, and I try to make the scenes really show who she is, and tell my stupid brain critic to shut up.  My husband says it's really good, and the best stuff I've written so far.  I feel like I am learning.  Goal: 8,335.  I've written 8,641 words.

Overall, so far NaNoWriMo is AWESOME.  :D

Someday is NOW

I've been thinking about what is really important for me to get done during the remainder of my ever shortening lifetime.  Okay, sure, that sounds pretty dark and pessimistic, but it's true.  So I'm paring down my list of "someday"s to the ones that really matter to me. 

One of the main things I had always planned to do was write a novel.  I love to write.  I wrote my first short story in the third grade, and it was actually quite long for a third-grader, it was around 10 pages written out, had several different chapters and lots of illustrations drawn in the margins.  All through elementary school and high school I wrote short stories and essays and I loved it, and I got lots of praise from my teachers.  By contrast, I never ever ever EVER got anything remotely resembling praise from any of my math teachers.  Or my gym teachers.  Or my science teachers, or geography, or history...

In college I majored in English, until one semester when I got fed up with being forced to take classes about reading Chaucer, or Beowulf, or Sir Gawain and the Green Knight.  I love reading and I read all the time, but I could only take so much of that.  I'd already taken all the English department's writing classes, so I switched to a Journalism major when I realized that it would let me spend more time actually studying writing.

But after I graduated and didn't have any deadlines pushing me, I pretty much stopped writing.  I've enjoyed the little bits of writing I've done here and there (such as this blog) but I have always wanted to write a novel.  Thinking about writing an entire novel is pretty intimidating, at least to me, and I kept putting it off.  So, I have decided to do...

NANOWRIMO!

Yay.  If you've never heard of it, you can go here for more info:  nanowrimo.org.  Basically it's NAtional NOvel WRIting Month, and part of its purpose is to kick dumbasses like me into gear and make us actually write something. 

From their site:  National Novel Writing Month is a fun, seat-of-your-pants approach to novel writing. Participants begin writing November 1. The goal is to write a 175-page (50,000-word) novel by midnight, November 30.  Valuing enthusiasm and perseverance over painstaking craft, NaNoWriMo is a novel-writing program for everyone who has thought fleetingly about writing a novel but has been scared away by the time and effort involved.  Because of the limited writing window, the ONLY thing that matters in NaNoWriMo is output. It's all about quantity, not quality. The kamikaze approach forces you to lower your expectations, take risks, and write on the fly.

I am SO excited.  To finish 50,000 words in 30 days works out to be 1,667 words per day.  On my first day I wrote 2,766.  I'm ahead, woo hoo!  To be fair, that first day was a Sunday, so I had the day off.  Plus there was an extra hour because of the time change.  But honestly, I have always been so intimidated at the very thought of writing a whole novel, just getting started was thrilling.  I have already worked out characters and an outline, so I have a specific direction to go.

I just hope I can keep it up, working full time (not to even mention my two hour a day commute, ugh) is going to mean I have a relatively narrow window of time each day to write, and I am going to have to do it every day or I'll get hopelessly behind.

Here I go, wish me luck!!

Fascinating (?) Facts About ellen

* I know my entire 10-digit library card number by heart

Thank goodness for libraries!  I wouldn't read nearly the amount of books that I do if I had to actually PAY for them all.  I love browsing through the big library downtown and picking up all types of different books: foreign cookbooks, photography and art books, travel guides, novels and biographies, funny books by famous comedians, books about history and psychology and technology.  Not even to mention the DVDs and CDs and audio books...

* I have recurring nightmares about public restrooms

I don't have them too often, usually when I am stressed or anxious about something.  I always have to pee so bad I literally can't stand it, and the public restroom is always disturbing in some way.  Sometimes I am looking desperately around a huge dark restroom and there are lots of stalls, but none of them have actual toilets in them.  Sometimes it's a giant crowded restroom with toilets sitting out in the open.  One time I dreamed I was in an empty abandoned house, in an upstairs room like a bedroom but with a toilet right in the center of the room, and a rusty clawfoot tub in the corner with a dismembered body in it.  One time I dreamed that I was in a plain generic office building, and the restroom was a big room of Victorian antiques, filled with fancy end tables with doilies and little figurines on them, and somehow those were the toilets and I was expected to pee on one. 

Don't bother trying to psychoanalyze my freaky subconscious, I clearly have privacy issues.  The funny thing is, I almost never have bad dreams, but when I do it is ALWAYS about a public restroom.

* I know all the words to the 70's song Ariel by Dean Friedman, and often sing it in the shower

I can't sing, of course. 
"She was a Jewish girl. I fell in love with her.
She wrote her number on the back of my hand.
I called her up, I was all out of breath, I said,
"Come hear me play in my rock and roll band."
I took a shower and I put on my best blue jeans.
I picked her up in my new VW van.
She wore a peasant blouse with nothing underneath.
I said, "Hi". She said, "Yeah, I guess I am."
It's a cute song, about a guy who meets a girl named Ariel, she comes to see him play in his rock and roll band, they go out to Dairy Queen, then they go back to his house and have spaghetti and talk into the night.  Did I mention that I can't sing?

* I do not wear deodorant or antiperspirant, ever

When I was a teen I tried, but they all gave me rashes (I have bad allergy-skin). So I gave up, and... nothing.  I kept waiting for the terrible stinkiness to start, but it never did.  I have literally asked every boyfriend I have ever had to smell my armpits, and they have all assured me that I smell fine.  Even during my unshaven hippie feminist phase.  I am not stinky.  Maybe it's all a big marketing ploy, and nobody needs to wear deodorant!   Damn those giant deodorant corporations.  Down with the man, fight the power!

Sydney's Cold Nose

Sometimes when she curls up to sleep she cradles her head in her paws.  Maybe her nose is too cold?  I'm not sure why she does it, but it's pretty cute.

The MID Of My Life

From Wikipedia:  Midlife crisis is a term coined in 1965 by Elliott Jaques and used to describe a period of dramatic self-doubt that is felt by some individuals in the "middle years" of life, as a result of sensing the passing of youth and the imminence of old age.
Jungian theory holds that midlife is key to individuation, a process of self-actualization and self-awareness that contains many potential paradoxes. Although Carl Jung did not describe midlife crisis per se, the midlife integration of thinking, sensation, feeling, and intuition that he describes could, it seems, lead to confusion about one's life to date and one's goals.

I think I might be having a midlife crisis.

It started a couple of years ago when I was visiting Mom. She always tries to give me stuff, old books and greeting cards that she'd saved and miscellaneous things that she doesn't want us kids to have to wade through when she passes away. Mostly she gives me photos, which I love. But it suddenly occurred to me: Mom is giving them to me because she's 88 years old and these photos are important; she wants someone to have them and appreciate them. But what happens when I die? I don't have any kids. My brother and my sister are both more than 20 years older than me and are not likely to be around after I'm gone. They each have one child, my niece and my nephew, who are (more or less) my age and have families of their own.

The thing is, a lot of the old photos are from Virginia, where my parents both grew up, and where I grew up. But the rest of my family grew up in Georgia, and that's where they all are now. So there are a lot of photos of neighbors, friends and even relatives that basically no one in my family really knows, other than my mom and me. After me, there is literally no one who will know who these people are, or care about the pictures.

These photos are so important. People's weddings and birthdays and graduations, Christmases and family dinners and county fairs. I have a photo of my cousin Bonnie, who died of breast cancer decades ago, eating my Dad's special Silver Queen corn on the cob at my parent's dining room table. And a photo of my aunt Mamie Sue, who passed away a few years ago, propping her swollen feet up at a Christmas party back in the late 70's. A snapshot of my mom holding our neighbor's newborn son (who is in the military now), she has a weird smile on her face because she's trying to look nice for the picture in spite of the baby's diaper leaking on her.

I started questioning my decision not to have children. After all, at 43 I am younger than my mother was when she got pregant with me. I haven't had any hints of peri-menopause and could, theoretically, get pregnant. But I really don't want to have a child, and it occurred to me that having a kid for purposes of passing on family photos would be a fairly bad reason.

Up until I started thinking about all this, I was enjoying making scrapbooks. I had made a couple and was working on a new one. But then I started questioning why? I make the scrapbook, look at it, show it to my husband and maybe my mom and a friend or two, then it goes on a shelf. Then I die and who cares about my scrapbook? It wouldn't mean anything to anybody else, in spite of all the loving care and time I put into it.

Then I just started feeling old in general. It suddenly hit me that all of those things that I had vaguely imagined I would do someday, like spending a month driving across the country, or running in a marathon, or going to New Zealand, or learning to speak French, or writing a novel, or seeing the Louvre, or losing enough weight to look good in a bikini, or skydiving, or hiking the Grand Canyon, would probably never happen. When I was in my 20's there was this big giant future ahead of me, and I imagined it filled with all manner of possiblities. But now I'm 43, and how many more years do I have? My mother is almost 90 and has always wanted to go to Hawaii, but she never got to, and now it's too late -- she is physically unable to travel that far. I hate it so much, it breaks my heart. I wish I could go back in time and buy plane tickets for her and my father to go on vacation to Hawaii, even if I had to sell a kidney to do it. But now it's too late.

So maybe I have another decade or two, if I'm lucky. But there is no way all of those things I imagined doing will ever be possible in my remaining "good years". Letting go of the idea of limitless possibilities and time for accomplishments feels like death to me.

I suppose what I need to do is prioritize. Forty-three is still young enough to have some time left to do some stuff. Imagining being at the end of my life, what would I most regret not doing?

Who knows, maybe at the end of my crisis I will be a self-actualized person. A self-actualized old person.

Killer Anniversary

Last Thursday my husband and I celebrated our 6th wedding anniversary by going to see The Killers in concert at the UCF Arena.  He is a huge Killers fan, I like them a lot but am not quite as familiar with their songs as he is.

We had never been to the UCF Arena before, even though we live pretty close.  We paid $10 to park in a garage and walked about a block to the Arena entrance.  The Arena was nice, we decided we need to go to concerts there more often from now on.

People-watching was awesome.  We saw drunk college guys double-fisting beers, skinny college chicks who couldn't have weighed 90 pounds, lots of tattoos and lots of cool Killers t-shirts.  (Also a lot of "Victims" shirts, which is The Killers' fan club.)  We also saw a lot of cougars, who were utterly true to their stereotype, wearing tight jeans with high heeled strappy sandals and following around the college boys.

Our seats were amazingly close to the stage.  I bought tickets in the center of the fourth row of the first balcony, which I was afraid would be too far back, but I knew we didn't want to be on the General Admission floor.  It turned out that the first balcony is only about 5 feet off the ground, it's basically just seats at the back of the GA floor, which wasn't very big.  We had a great view of the stage.

There's really something magical about the atmosphere at a concert, and this particular concert was spectacular.  The whole audience was on its feet dancing and singing along for the entire 90 minutes.  The look on my husband's face as he sang his favorite songs and danced (danced?  he never dances!) was absolutely joyful, and made me so happy.  It was a wonderful and perfect way to celebrate our anniversary.

Too bad that we are obviously quite old and congealed, because we were both sore the next day from dancing.  How pitiful!  We clearly need to do this way more often.

Now if only Lil Wayne, or John Mayer, or the Foo Fighters, or Pink would come to the UCF Arena...

Dentophobia

I make jokes about being dentophobic because I think the word sounds funny. However, it is not, in my opinion, a true phobia.

Phobia is defined as a persistent, irrational fear of a specific object, activity, or situation that leads to a compelling desire to avoid it.  My dislike of dentists is not irrational, but is based on more than 3 decades of unpleasantness, pain and blood.

The first time I ever went to the dentist I was 11.  The dentist was a loud, overweight bald guy, who made inappropriate "jokes" about how tight my shirt was and whether or not I had a boyfriend.  He creeped me out in a way that I had never experienced before.  I was also kind of scared, having heard all the stereotypical hating-on-dentists jokes, and he made fun of me for being afraid to have a cavity filled.  I ended up crying the whole time he was filling my tooth.

Then a year or two later that same dentist decided I needed braces, but first he pulled 6 (six) teeth. Then I had braces for two years.  Luckily the orthodontist he sent us to was very nice, so the braces ordeal was about as pleasant as it could be.

I continued going to that same creepy dentist for the next year or so, until we all started noticing that my teeth didn't meet at all except at the very back of the right side of my mouth.  (I wrote about it here.)  There was literally an inch of space between my front teeth when my mouth was completely closed.  This was not because my teeth were growing in crookedly, my actual JAWS were.  So, another referral from creepy dentist, and we started seeing a surgeon to get ready for the surgery.

But first, another year of braces to get everything in place.  Do you know how much fun it is for a teenage girl to have braces TWICE?  No fun at all, that's how much.

So my parents and I met with this surgeon guy, where he repeatedly assured us that the surgery really wasn't as bad as it sounded.  It was similar to having wisdom teeth out.  Sure, I'd have to be in the hospital for a week, but that was just to learn how to eat with my mouth wired shut.

I remember being in the hospital the night before, meeting the anesthesiologist and thinking this feels like a very big deal.  Then in the morning they came to take me to surgery, and gave me an IV that knocked me out.  The next thing I knew I was in Cardiac Intensive Care, with electrodes on my chest hooked up to beeping machines.  Through a fog of anesthesia I was dimly aware of my parents there, very upset (my Mom was crying) and a nurse saying something about trouble controlling bleeding during surgery.  The next day I was a little more conscious, and Mom brought me the newly released Purple Rain album.  I remember the nurse giving me a sponge bath, and trying clean my long thick hair, which was caked with dried blood.

Oh, and learning to eat with my mouth wired shut?  The tips of teeth were enclosed in a plastic tray, my braces were wired together top to bottom, the only space to take any liquid in my mouth was the space between each front tooth.  Basically, I learned that all I could do was suck lukewarm liquid through my teeth.  Fun.  I actually developed a bit bigger space between two front top teeth, which they told me was normal and would go away when I got unwired (it did).

Then a year or so after that I got all four wisdom teeth cut out, which was not pleasant but obviously better than the surgery.  In the meantime I also had a couple more cavities filled, once with no novocaine (the dentist didn't think I'd need it, and I ended up crying all through the procedure while he kept saying we were almost done).  Did I mention that one time, when they did use novocaine, the needle hit a blood vessel in my mouth?  My mouth filled up with blood, my blood pressure dropped, yadda yadda yadda.  That happens to everyone, right?

So, to recap:  before the age of 20 I have had 6 teeth pulled, 3 or 4 cavities filled, braces for two years, braces again for another year, horrible face-bone-cracking-and-wiring-back-together surgery, mouth wired shut for a month, 4 impacted wisdom teeth removed, and much miscelleaneous pain and blood, and creepiness.

I go off into the world as an adult, out of my parent's control, and I think: to hell with this dentist crap.  That is enough of THAT.  And even though I really did understand the importance of taking care of your teeth, somehow 5 years went by without any trips to the dentist.  I moved to a new state and never found a dentist, and time passed without my realizing it, the way it is wont to do.

So in my mid-20's I found a dentist recommended by a friend, and though I was anxious, I made the appointment.  I told them when I made the appointment that I was afraid of dentists and haven't been in a very long time, and the lady on the phone was nice but abrupt.  When I got there, the dentist lady made no attempt to hide her disgust with the kind of person who would go five years without a cleaning. When the x-rays showed no cavities, she was quick to point out how lucky someone like me is to avoid teeth rotting right out of my head, and I would swear that the hygeinist made cleaning my teeth more painful than necessary.

I went home and cried, and felt like I was probably at fault.  I went back to that dentist another time or two, and there always seemed to be an undercurrent of meanness.  They kept telling me that my teeth still looked awful, that it would take years to undo the damage I had done by going so long without cleanings.  When I moved to a different part of town, I decided I wouldn't go back, I'd find a better place.

Of course, you know what happened.  I dreaded it so much I kept putting it off, and then all of a sudden several more years had gone by.  If my teeth had been in such bad shape then, how much worse had they gotten since?   I would lie awake at night worrying.

Two years ago I finally turned the corner where worrying about what would happen if I DIDN'T go became more terrifying than worrying about what would happen if I DID go.  Unable to get any recommendations from friends, I finally just picked a dentist nearby, in an office that looked nice. 

Gee, guess what happened?  The x-rays showed no cavities, but the dentist said I had severe periodontal disease that had eaten away a significant amount of the bone, which meant that my teeth were in danger of falling out.  The only thing that could prevent that was an extremely expensive laser procedure, which my insurance wouldn't cover.  They cleaned my teeth using a process called scaling, with no novocaine, which was literally one of the most painful things I have ever experienced.  And also bloody.  I was in his office for two hours of stomach clenching, tearful horror.

I was still in pain and crying when my husband got home from work.  Why had I even let them do that to me, he asked?  Why didn't I just leave?  After all, I didn't even know for sure what the dentist had told me was correct.

It honestly never occurred to me to leave.  This is what going to the dentist is for me, I sobbed to my husband.  It ALWAYS hurts, it's ALWAYS horrible, it's ALWAYS like this.

I asked around at work, and found several people recommending a dentist right near our office.  Panic and anxiety combined to make me immoble once again, and it took much longer than it should have to make the appointment.  Plus, it was harder to coordinate this time, since my husband would have to come with me for hand-holding/tissue detail.

I went last week, just for x-rays and a check-up, no cleaning or procedures of any kind.  X-rays showed one small cavity, and periodontic disease that had resulted in some bone loss.  They were so nice to me, and very patient, and explained that if I came in for scaling and took good care to get my teeth cleaned regularly I'd be okay.  Yesterday I went in for the first of two scaling procedures and the hygienist was so nice.  She obviously went out of her way to be encouraging, and kind.  My husband pulled a chair close to me and held my hand during the whole thing.  I had to get six shots of novocaine, which wasn't fun, and the procedure took more than an hour, but it really wasn't bad.  The hygienist called me "sweetie", and kept telling me I was doing great, and my teeth were looking beautiful.

Even with all that encouragement and wonderfulness, I still had uncontrollable stomach clenchiness and had to keep reminding myself to breathe.  And, truth be told, I got a little bit teary.  But I feel much less anxious about going back for the second half, and I feel like I have finally found a dental office of people who not only good at what they do, but also are NICE.