NaNoWriMo Ring

On my first day I knocked down two chapters, comprising roughly 5,000 words and change. I’ve yet to knock off for the day, but I’ll be noodling around on another project, getting stuff down, so that’s all I’ll do on the novel for today. It’s going well—still feeling my way through a couple of things, but those will either be straightened out in a rewrite or cut. Situation normal in that regard.

One of the points I made in the NaNoWriMo prep classes was that folks need a space where all they were going to do during November was write. It’s good advice, but I admit it might well be impractical. For me it absolutely is, since my office is my office. I write in here, yes, but also use it for Second Life and Skyping and a mess of other things. Moving the computer to another room to write would be impractical.

But I hit upon another expedient. It was a trick I used when I was writing my Belit novel a couple of years ago. Because I can’t shift my place to remind me that I’m supposed to be writing, I made a change in me to remind me.

Several years ago I picked up a black ring with silver tribal designs on it. I bought it at Hot Topic. It’s size 11 or 12. I bought it to try out a magic trick I’d studied. Turns out my fingers are a bit weirdly shaped (probably from years of soccer and typing) so the ring doesn’t move on and off my fingers as easily as it should. David Copperfield can rest easy now.

But I’ve decided to convert that ring to another use. I’m a touch typist. The left thumb is the only finger you don’t use when typing, so I’ve slapped the ring on that finger. When I’m at the machine for writing, the ring goes on to remind me that’s what I’m doing. No distractions, no phone calls, no nothing. It’s just me and the story.

Doing little tricks to focus is a good way to keep your mind, well, focused. The reason for that is simple: our job is to allow our imaginations to run wild, and that is just too easy. One thought connects to another, or the phone rings, and we’re off on a rocket. When we really need to be back and focused on slotting one word after another.

This morning I did see an interesting story before I got to work. It’s about a town in the UK, Argleton, which does not exist. Except in Google. I remember a Fred Saberhagen Berserker story that hinged on the same concept. Even in the story a man is quoted about how he was constructing his own fantasy around the idea of the town. And I have been told that maps of Arizona have phantom towns, but list them as ghost towns so no one will drive there thinking they can get gas or food.

Concepts like that are things that fire the imagination and provide great surprises in stories. Imagine driving late at night and finding a town where there isn’t supposed to be one; or a town that moves around through time or geography. (Yes, I know many stories have been done about both situations so I don’t need cites, and I know many more will be done in the future.)

Word count for November: Hard: 5016, Soft: 1063.

Tomorrow night we’ll be talking about World Fantasy and NaNoWriMo at office hours. That’s 6 Pacific in Second Life. Feel free to join in.