The last week has begun–the mad dash to the finish line. I lost my cushion by taking two days off and now I’m working hard on catching up. As much as I loved my cushion, I loved relaxing even more. I didn’t realize how much I needed it but my body was telling me that I need a break in every way–still is, really. So, I listened. I plan on being back on track by the tomorrow. Falling behind by even a full day would be very hard to recover from.
Thanksgiving is only a few days away and, while writing during one family-filled day would be difficult, I get the pleasure of trying to write during three. Thursday at Mom’s house, Friday at Dad’s and Saturday at the in-laws. Family + Writing + Travel + Stormy Weather = Holy hell, what was I thinking?
My word count has been moving at a snails pace for the past few days but I’ve reached 39,760 words!
39,760 / 50,000 (79.5%)
And I’ve reached a dilemma. On the upside, I’m a mere 3,000 words shy of completing my novel (insane!). On the downside, that isn’t going to take me to the 50,000 word goal. Here are my options:
1) Complete my novel and call it ‘good’. I won’t be an official NaNoWriMo winner but I will have completed a novel and proven to myself that I can complete a substantial length of work in a ridiculously short period of time. Honestly, I already feel like a winner and I haven’t even finished yet. I can’t believe what I’ve accomplished.
2) Once I complete my novel, I try to pull another 8,000 words out of thin air. I don’t have anything else after this outlined and, while I’m sure I’ll add more as I’m editing, my story is pretty much finished–there are no holes to fill in. As stressed as I’ve been, it would probably be even more stressful to try to create new ideas just to shove them in for a higher word count. But, I would be an official NaNoWriMo winner and be able to celebrate with all the other NaNoWriMo winners.
With that said, I would really love to be an official winner (I feel a pang of excitement just thinking about it) but, as I said before, I do already feel like I’ve won and I’m worried about over-stressing myself.
My plan is to move forward, following the schedule, until I complete my novel–probably in the next day or two–and then decide what I want to do from there. But it might still come down to a coin toss.
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