Week two was a struggle. I feel like I built up all this momentum in week one, all this excitement for the story and then somewhere around the beginning of week 2 (most likely when my outline went off the rails), I started to lose interest.
Thankfully, I got it back and finally I’m now back up to my usual enjoyment of my novel. Other aspects involving the monthly challenge I’m not so enthused about currently, but we’ll get to that here shortly.
Day 8: 2,574 words in 1 hour and 10 minutes
Day 9: 1,772 words in 40 minutes
Day 10: 1,696 words in 52 minutes
Day 11: 1,715 words in 45 minutes
Day 12: 1,917 words in45 minutes
Day 13: 1,892 words in 45 minutes
Day 14: 1,716 words in 40 minutes
Monthly Total: 29,691
Overall, I’m proud of my progress over week two, especially with the lack of motivation I was feeling and everything else going on with the website and certain allegations.
What most of you don’t know is I am a Municipal Liaison (ML) for my county. I’ve been an ML and working with participants since 2015. I started to volunteer for NaNoWriMo because I believed in what they stood for: There’s a novel in everyone, creativity rules, and increased literacy across the globe. I have donated to them, bought merch from them and supported their cause pretty much since I started participating in 2009.
The current allegations are sickening. In fact, the way the company has been trending for the last few years has been sickening. I do not condone what has happened with NaNoWriMo.
NaNoWriMo used to be a place for creatives, a place for the artists and likeminded people to get together and enjoy suffering through writing a novel in a month. It was a place where people who were usually on the outskirts (introverts, book nerds, geeks and anyone else) could be included.
Now, after the recent website changes in 2019, the staff changes throughout the years, the pandemic and these sickening accusations of child endangerment among other things have made it ugly. When complaints surfaced, instead of being heard, users were silenced, banned, blocked and suspended, effectively giving NaNoWriMo a culture of fear and intimidation. That is not what NaNoWriMo should be, but that is what it became.
The forums shut down on November 11th when the board of NaNoWriMo stepped in to investigate. I’ve been reading what should be updates from the board and instead, the forum post is filled with hate, with vitriol toward other users and all around yucky meanness. Users in the forums are throwing anyone and everyone under the bus, including MLs, Staff, HQ and other users. Even TikTok has gotten ahold of the news and has made it a big over conflated mess.
That is not what NaNoWriMo should be. We shouldn’t be fighting with our fellow novelists, discounting the experiences of those vulnerable YWPers who have chosen to share their insights.
I DO NOT CONDONE WHAT NANOWRIMO HAS BECOME.
Currently, I can’t step down from my ML position. I have too many new participants this year that thankfully don’t seem to be on the forums as much. I would love for them to have as good of an experience during their first year as I did. I would love for them to find the good in NaNoWriMo, but I’m not sure how that can happen this year.
After November, and hopefully after the investigations, NaNoWriMo can be better than it was. I’m not sure I’ll be as much of a part of it, if at all.
We’ll see.
In the meantime, I’m going to keep writing and keep creating.
See you next week for another writing update!
