All Saints meet NaNoWriMo

November first is All Saints Day. I never quite knew what that was because I'm not Catholic, although I have many Catholic friends and growing up I always thought how fortunate they were to have no school the day after Halloween. The public school kids would trudge off to school working through the sugar hangovers from the night before and the Catholic kids got to stay home and finish off their bags of candy or sleep in and sleep off the sugar high.

Those were the days! We didn't worry about our candy being contaminated or tampered with. Word got around quick as to which neighbor was giving out the best treats. Our biggest concern were the bag snatchers, older kids who would come up behind unsuspecting young ones and steal their stash. And the bags we had back then! Not the fancy schmancy things kids tote around these days. We had brown paper bags and pillow cases. Some kids were lucky and had the little plastic pumpkins with handles but most kids made due with what ever they could come up with.

We'd come home with tons of candy, sort it out, trade with siblings or friends, eat our selves silly and maybe save some for later. And of course the public school kids had to go to bed early if November 1 fell on a school day so our sugar intake was limited.

That was then, and now today, November 1st holds a new meaning for me. This is the first day of NaNoWriMo - National Novel Writing Month. This is the day I started my first real novel. I'm not going to write much about it today, only to say that I must write 50,000 words by the end of the month. I believe I'm off to a decent start since I've written almost 4,000  words so far.

I'm amazed at how this project is going and how my mind is sifting through things gathering material for the novel. It's an interesting process. I get to be participant and observer at the same time. Everything I encounter goes into my mind and gets examined for whatever pieces may be used in the story. Images get expanded upon and stored for later use. Phrases get scrutinized for their applicability to certain dialog. Ideas get morphed into usable scenes. It's all coming together bit by bit. I'm almost 10% done. It's a very good feeling!