Right. So that previous hopeful statement of “I’m doing it!” has sputtered and failed. For example, today I had my cousins over, entertained a four-and-a half year-old and 7-year-old, both with more energy then three espresso shots, cleaned ground up yellow Play Dough out of the cream-colored carpet, photographed the cat after it had been labeled with a post-it note (“Cat”), juggled Scooby Doo movie watching with a contentious architect meeting, and then died. Seriously, why do I want children someday?

And NaNoWriMo’s emails to me, far from being encouraging, are downright jerky. “You should be at 15,000 words by Monday! Better put the pedal to the metal! Are you writing?” Ha. Ha hah ha.

I signed up for NaNoWriMo two years ago, thinking, strangely enough, that I had time to write a book while I was working two jobs and going to graduate school full time. Ha! By the end of the day, all I wanted to do was watch the one hour of television I had TiVo’d and then go to sleep.

But the time has come. Well, more time, I guess. As of today I’m 4,000 words into my story and it really wasn’t hard to write it at all. I keep having to resist my favorite urge, which is to edit heavily as I write, but that’s a good thing, as it means that I’ll just have more words by the time I’m done!

Also, let it be known that I’m technically cheating, as I had a few of these words written before the Nov. 1 start date. But since this novel was started in the spirit of NaNoWriMo, I’m not nit-picking a hundred words. Nor should you.

Anyways, Reputation, is, ironically enough, a case of writing a second story first. So, I’ve had this story in my brain about a girl raising her niece alone since I was a teenager. Naturally, it has gone through many, many, many mental revisions, and I totally scrapped the page and a half I had written at the age of 15. (It has sentences like, “The sky was black as pitch” in it. *Shudder*). Today’s version has some kinks in it, of course, and since I love the tale so much, when it comes down to actually taking the story out of my head and writing it down, I get very nervous.

However, our trusty sidekick to the hero in this story is a complete unknown. Until his best friend, I have not invested my heart and soul into his character. He has some basic characteristics, of course, but his story is much simpler to tell, overall, and I don’t care half as much about him. Therefore, I’m starting my first book with him, my second story, and I’ll go back and write the first story later, when the world i’m creating is more fleshed out. Funnily enough, his file on my computer is still listed under “Beth’s Story.” Totally inappropriate. Poor Charles.