Tag campnanowrimo

Happy birthday, Caravan of Composition!

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Today has been a full day. Youngest graduated from elementary school, and both boys enjoyed the bell-ringing satisfaction indicating the start of summer break. Following the graduation ceremony/last exam, we celebrated at their favorite restaurant, then came home and brainstormed a summer chore chart and screen time limits. I shifted my focus toward Camp NaNoWriMo, which starts on Monday, and checked off a handful of items on my to-do list. I nearly let the milestone pass me by.

Caravan of Composition is officially two years old today. My blogging habits seem to go in waves, but I am pleased to say I’ve kept up with this blog and my previous one for over eleven years. That’s like a million in procrastinator years. It’s challenging sometimes to come up with things to write about as life isn’t always “blog-worthy”, and I struggle with insecurities regarding the merit of what I have to say. A good friend sent me a recent copy of Josh Radnor’s Museletter in which he mentions nearly the exact feeling. We might not always feel that what we have to say is worth saying. Are my words of value to my readers? Does what I say matter?

Let’s get one thing straight: I like to listen to myself talk. My family can attest to this. I love to tell stories, often the same ones over and over (more vigorous nods from the van clan), and the level of exaggeration often increases with each retelling. For dramatic effect, of course. A small stretching of the truth makes things more interesting. There is always a fair amount of accompanying hand gestures, because my heritage demands it and they, too, add to the drama of a good story.

Blogging is different. First of all, I can’t use my hands or facial expressions to drive a point home. Second, the delete button allows me to rethink things that may sound stupid or cause a foot in mouth moment. (I have a lot of those in real life.) But it also sometimes restricts the flow of words. I have several unpublished blog posts that sit in the drafts folder because either I got distracted by life or decided what I had to say wasn’t of any value.

We are our own worst critics, aren’t we? Some of us don’t care and live an unfiltered life – taking the good and the bad as they come. Some of us let our inner critic keep us from pursuing our dreams. Some, like me, fall in the middle. Moments of feeling brilliant coupled with moments of crippling self-doubt. And I can’t write this post telling you how to quiet your inner critic, because if I did, mine would be muzzled in the corner. But I can say this: we rarely give ourselves the credit we deserve. Celebrate your successes, no matter how small they seem.

Today, I celebrate my eleventh year of shouting into the void, and the second birthday of my current blog. I celebrate getting my kiddos through another school year. I celebrate the sun, and summer, and the start of another month of Camp NaNo.

And I celebrate you, dear reader, for allowing me to keep doing what I love.

 

How to pack for Camp

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Camp NaNoWriMo starts Monday which, incidentally, is also the day I become a parent of a teenager.

I can’t decide if I should be stocking up on coffee or vodka.

This April marks my fourth time doing Camp NaNoWriMo, which is a relaxed version of the National Novel Writing Month that takes place every November. You set your own writing goals, and I learned the hard way that they better be realistic or I’m a barrel of disappointment by the time I reach the end of the month.

Writing camp takes preparation, much like regular camping. The first time I tried it, I was woefully unprepared. It was a disaster, much like the first time hubs and I went camping and realized we were missing about half the things one needs to survive a weekend in the woods.

My life is a bit crazy. But recently I decided that if I am going to be a successful writer, I need to look at it more like a second job rather than a hobby. Something I commit to. Solid, productive writing. Not opening a word document, staring at it for a while, then wandering the Internet. The problem? I’ve been frustrated with my current project and afraid to wander back into the novel I shelved last year after a round of query rejections. I needed to get out of my head and let the words flow. But how?

While writing SECOND IN COMMAND, I had tight deadlines, which was extremely motivating. So the first thing I did was look at my calendar and give myself an end date. The annual PennWriters conference is mid-May, and I signed up for pitch appointments. Which means I need to have a project to pitch. A finished project.

Step One: Set a deadline for writing project. Commit to focusing on that project ONLY.

I printed out a March-April calendar, looked at it alongside our life calendar, and circled days I would be able to write. I think one of the obstacles facing writers who also work, raise children, take care of households, etc, is that we feel guilty carving out time for writing. But writing is important. Even if it pays very little or not at all, it is something I need to have in my life. I’m happier when I’m writing. It’s therapy. So far I have followed through and written on my circled days, and on the non circled days I spend extra time with my family or just relax. Giving myself permission to take time off in between has helped me focus on my writing days.

Step Two: Create mini-deadlines. Make them reasonable. If they aren’t working, revisit the schedule. Celebrate success. Crossing off days is weirdly rewarding. (Stickers work well too.) I calculated how much work I need to do to finish the project in time for PennWriters, and wrote mini-deadlines on the circled days.

The time part figured out, I moved to the other part of my blockage. Where the hell do I even start with this thing? The novel originally had two separate story lines, and the feedback I got was that they weren’t gelling and a few agents didn’t like the one character’s voice. So I cut her. And was left with half a book. Now what? I needed to get back to the drawing board. I read books on outlining and plotting, and thought ugh, I’m normally a panster, but I don’t have time to spend in multiple revisions. I need to fill the plot holes early.

Step Three: Make a plan. Get the hard stuff out of the way.

I brainstormed on my trusty legal pad, then filled out note cards for each chapter. They’re three different colors to indicate where they fit within the three act structure. I figured out which chapters from the original version would work moving forward and where I’d need to add additional content.

I’ve been writing for two weeks now, and the note cards have been an amazing tool. I know where the scene starts and what I need to include and can focus fleshing out characters and creating tension. The fun stuff. I told hubs last night that this is the first time I’ve been able to write freely in a long time. It feels good. Of course there was a large hurdle to overcome — my first scene is brand new, and right now, it’s not great. But I got to the point where I had to tell myself to let it go and move on. To paraphrase Dory: Just Keep Writing.

Step Four: Find ways to keep the flow moving. Meditate. Close your eyes and focus on your breath. Go for a walk. Focus on how your senses perceive the world around you.

Step Five: Love yourself. The last thing I did to get ready is a tip I learned from @qnwrites on Instagram. She posted about writing a letter to her future self that she’d open during Camp. I loved this idea and expanded it a little by writing letters to my future self to be opened at the end of each week of Camp and when I finished each section of the book.

notes

They’re color coded to match my index cards. Of course.

I taped them up on my bulletin board to keep myself on track and motivated.

April is packed. The boys’ activities fill our calendar, my parents return from Florida mid-month, and our biggest recruitment event at work happens on April 30. In addition to Camp NaNoWriMo, I’m also this month’s hashtag leader for the Writing Challenge  on Twitter. And we’re taking a mini vacation to visit family. Whenever I open my online calendar, panic ensues.

Step Six: Commit to sit. It’s the only way. Fill the coffee mug, crank the tunes, and write.

 

If at first you don’t succeed, set the bar lower

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Okay, that sounds a bit pessimistic. But hear me out. If you wanted to become a high jumper, you wouldn’t set the bar at a height impossible to clear, right? You’d start low and get really good at each level before moving up to the next. If you are learning a new skill, you’d start with the basics and then work yourself up to the more complicated elements. And maybe you’d fail a few times, or a few million times before you could do the thing you set out to do, and maybe that feeling of failure lights a fire under you and forces you to try harder.

But you know what else is super motivating? Success.

I have participated in Camp NaNoWriMo three times. It’s an online contest of sorts that grew out of NaNoWriMo, or National Novel Writing Month, where to win you must write 50k words in a month. Camp is more laid back (as camp should be). You set your own goals and have a cabin of fellow writers to cheer you on and make references to roasting marshmallows and making s’mores. It’s fun. It’s encouraging. The first time I participated, I agreed to join a large cabin – some writers I knew, some I didn’t. There were virtual crafts, write-ins, and shout outs on Twitter. At the time I was revising my second novel and thought two hours a day seemed a reasonable goal. But I started the month off on a road trip, clocked zero hours of revisions for the first few days, and rapidly became discouraged. There’s this great STATS feature, which tells you your daily progress, how much you should do to reach your goal, and if you continue at your current rate you will finish…. in 2020.

The second time around I was working on a new novel, and decided 10k was reasonable. It wasn’t. Our cabin had only three members, and we had some amazing discussions about plotting and staying confident in your work. I made more time to write, but the words weren’t flowing and again I felt discouraged by the ever distant finish rate.

Third time’s the charm. Between April and July, I worked to unclog the stuff that wasn’t working and brought the first chapter to my critique group. They loved it and told me to keep going.

Let me stop here for a second. I know some of my blog followers aren’t writers and they are probably skimming through this post because blah, blah, blah she’s carrying on about writing again. Look. Your words can make a difference in someone’s life: your child, spouse, co-worker, employee, friend. A stranger. Be kind. Encourage someone today. It might be the very thing they need to keep moving forward.

When I decided to join Camp NaNoWriMo this past month, I thought about my goal. I didn’t want it to be too high and get discouraged. July was busy, people. BUSY. But I didn’t want it to be too low and seem insignificant. I thought about what my friend Kate had said a while ago, about setting micro-goals. If I could sit down every day and write something, 100 words, I would keep moving forward on the story. I set my overall goal for the month at 4k, and did my best to write at least 100 words every day. I didn’t write every day (I missed about half), but when I did, it was always more than 100 words. Sometimes it was only a few more, sometimes a lot more.

So I set the bar lower, but at a reasonable, attainable height. And it worked. The project is at 12k and I’m excited to keep writing.

And it feels pretty good to see this:

camp win

Are you trying to accomplish something and feeling overwhelmed? Can you break it up into smaller, more manageable micro-goals? Find a way to earn success. To celebrate the mini victories and stay motivated.

You got this.

Happy Camper

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I love camping. Fresh air, campfires, afternoon naps in the sun. The blissful escape from routine.

Back in the days before kids, hubs and I camped all over the state. We weren’t very adept when we started out—on our first trip we forgot pillows and other essentials and had to drive to a nearby mega store. (Incidentally that was not the only time I forgot pillows on a camping trip and had to drive to a store to buy them; somehow pillows are not high on my list of necessities for sleep).

I remember trying to cook in the pouring rain, hunched over the propane stove, umbrella in one hand, utensil in the other, and then eating our meal in the car. After that we purchased a simple canopy, which took off down the hill in a strong gust of wind and retrieved right before it landed in a nearby creek.

But the misadventures were part of what made camping great, the stories I tell when people ask why I love it. During a visit to Letchworth State Park, we arrived to discover the campsite was full. The ranger directed us to a nearby campground which turned out to be one of our favorite places to stay.

Enter children.

When our oldest was two, we took him to the above mentioned favorite campground. He had a blast despite the rainy conditions. However, I fretted for most of the weekend and did not enjoy the mountain of muddy laundry on Sunday night.

Next we tried to camp on the beach. Readers, you should NEVER CAMP ON THE BEACH. A strong wind collapsed our tent in half on itself (there is no way to fully stake it in the sand), the lack of distinguishable sites meant our neighbors were all on top of us, and when we got home after leaving early because of previously stated reasons, SAND WAS EVERYWHERE.

EVERYWHERE.

At first I laughed. “Hey, everything’s sandy, like me!” Two years later I used one of our sleeping bags as a prop in a play and my student commented on the sand still stuck in the bag. I had stopped laughing.

That ended camping for a while. When our youngest joined scouts, we started going as a family to overnight cabin trips, and took the boys to summer scout camp. The camping bug returned, and I remembered why I loved it. This despite the constant rain during summer camp, a car that smelled like wet feet, and a kid so covered in mosquito bites I needed to dump him into a bathtub full of calamine lotion.

Through scouts we found a great group of friends with similar aged kids who also loved to camp. Moms who don’t mind getting dirty and being without makeup or running water. We took them to our favorite spot and had an amazing weekend. But camping with two kids is a lot of work. The prep, the execution, the cleanup. I do most of it on my own. Also, to be perfectly honest, I’m not a huge fan of sleeping on the ground.

So when an opportunity came along to buy a small cottage on the lake, we jumped on it. Hubs calls it glamping because it has all of the things we love about camping—nature, fire pits, no technology, without the things we hate—sleeping on the ground, washing dishes in a plastic tub, dealing with drunk neighbors. I love waking up early and watching the sunrise. Sitting around the campfire and playing board games with my family. Curling up with a good book and taking a nap in the middle of the afternoon. No TV, no video games, the responsibilities of life left at home, at least for the weekend.

Camp NaNoWriMo kicked off on Sunday. We were out at the cottage, and despite the sweltering heat I was able to get back into my WIP and make forward progress. Last week I took the first chapter to my critique group and they loved it. Told me I needed to keep writing. When camp started I set a modest goal and made a commitment to myself to sit down every day and write. So far so good. We’re back out at the lake and I am sure my muse has found me here. (She likes to go places with no wifi—who knew?) Our friends are coming up for the holiday and I hope they love it as much as we do.

camping

Ready to write on the first day of Camp NaNoWriMo

Sometimes I think the secret to life is as simple as this: find what makes you happy and do it. Adjust as necessary to accommodate children and bad  backs.