So I did it. I finished National Novel Writing Month six days ago. They call that “winning” when you complete it. I wrote 50,130 words without going back and rereading, editing, cringing. When I signed up on a whim on November 1 (the first day of the annual event, which attracts millions of writers, would-be and established alike), my goal was to write the non-fiction book I’ve been “working on” for two years. I’d taken a book proposal class and written most of a proposal, met with agents and publishers, who told me memoirs are like fiction and you don’t do proposals, but write the actual book for submission. I had carefully considered what I’d say on the talk show circuit. Everything was done but the actual writing. Given that I’ve already shelled out for a memoir writing retreat next March, I figured I should have some words written to consider. And I’d had a whole lot of trouble starting.

My shrink did her Ph.D. thesis on procrastination and we’d talked a lot about why I had such a hard time starting. Part of it is about the difficulty of beginnings. Once I get going on a project, I’m good, but knowing where to start, particularly on big projects, can stop me cold. People kept telling me to just start writing. But I needed to know where to begin before I could. It was a round robin conversation I had with so many people. Don’t worry about where you begin, just start. “But where do I start?” It was like we were speaking different languages that sounded exactly alike. In a way we were. I’m one of those people who must know what’s next. In the car driving to someplace new, I start asking what the next move is as soon as I made the last turn. I’m a planner.

Writing has been my vocation and avocation as long as I’ve had either. I’ve never done anything else for money as an adult. And whether for fun or profit, my writing has largely come easily to me. I see in my head where I want to go with a story and I write it. But this? This was different. Barring a few days where I had a clue what I wanted to write about, it was hard. And I can see that moving forward will be even harder.

After I finish my next deadline run, I’ll read through those words and see if there’s anything worth keeping or something that jumps out at me as a place to start or a path to follow. And then I’ll start all over again. I was so naïve. Published writers, well known, respected, lauded writers have said how hard it all is and I thought I’d be different. I thought I’d just know what I wanted to write and it would fall out of my brain. There’d be some editing; an agent or publisher would want things changed. But I figured it would go for my book the way it has gone for every article I’ve written over 25 plus years. Ha! It’s going to be agony.

But here’s something I learned during NaNoWriMo: I want to do it anyway.