In Which I Tell You Why

What's that? November, also known as NaNoWriMo, starts less than 24 hours from now? Yes. And you bet your sweet bippy I'll be there on the front lines come midnight tomorrow, ready to write my first novel. (Well, as ready as a person would normally be to spend all their free time for the next month writing something that might turn out to be junk) If you haven't heard about it before, it's 30 days in which people all around the world try to write their own 50,000 word novel.  If you think this sounds cool, and maybe you'd like to try it, THERE'S STILL TIME TO SIGN UP. :)  Go to nanowrimo.org and make an account.

National Novel Writing Month is a great way to get out there just for fun and force yourself to meet a ridiculously demanding deadline with thousands of other people who are doing it too (read: huge support system). One of the great things about writing is that there are no masters; no one really knows what's going to find an audience and what's for sure not. One of the great things about writing for NaNo is that it is almost impossible to crank out an amazing novel-formed masterpiece in only 30 days. But knowing from the get-go that it's unlikely you'll win does not keep people from trying. In fact, it makes the race all the better because there is so little to lose. Worst case scenario: your month long project that you chose to do for fun turned out to be junk. Best case scenario? You write a perfectly spine tingling novel that everyone wants to read and own for the rest of human time. The win possiblities are off every rational chart there is, whereas the greatest possible loss is something anyone could handle. Just don't make any crazy bets on your life that you'll make it or anything.

It's a month in which anything could be possible, and people are pushed to achieve more than they believe they can on a regular basis.

Because I think it's so awesome, I even follow nanowrimo on twitter. In these days leading up to a crazy writing goal, they asked their followers Why They Write.

*pause*

*You hear deep breathing*

Oh Gosh, sorry. I just love this perfume I'm wearing so much. It smells like the insides of rose blooms hidden in the snuggly warmth under a comforter in the early morning. 

What's that? You mean you've never smelled that before? I tell you, you're missing out. Some smells are sweet, like strawberry smoothies. But others are like this- not sweet or bitter, but somewhere in between. The scents you breathe straight to your heart; like home or socks or yoga mats (if you're a yogi). Some smells you love because they're good. And some smells are good because you love them.

But I've gotten off track. I was supposed to tell you Why I Write.

First, there's the entertainment factor. I like to laugh and be able to share the joke with other people I care about. Writing that joke myself makes me feel like I'm clever and funny; in general, worth something. Everyone enjoys a good story, and I swell with pride and my cheeks flush when I can do something that people enjoy. And even if it's a bad story, it can still be funny in it's badness. 

On the other hand, I sometimes write personal stuff that I don't share with anybody. In this case, I write out of curiosity about myself. I want to record my life, in my own unique Heidi voice. I like being able to look back at old writings and see how I've changed as a person. My journey (and yours too) is unique. Match that with one's own unique voice and you've got the potential for a story no one has ever heard before, in the way that you tell it. Awesome.

Okay, so that's me. What about you? Why do you write?