"A Matter of the Soul" -- Draft complete!

Another November has passed, and the busy-ness of “Christmas” is now on its way out. I’d like to reflect upon my Nov 2019 writing, to share some of the process.

My last post was written on the first day of November, before I started my novel. It was an unusual post for me, written quickly without much thought or revision. Once I’d written it, thinking it was just for me, to get me started, I realized it needed to be shared, so into my blog it went.

November is a special month for me, because it’s the one month of the year I give myself permission to put writing ahead of anything I’m able to set aside. That keeps me focused on writing, and pretty eager the whole month through.

This past November was different. It was, like the title of the story I was writing, a matter of the Soul. I felt this strong urge to get the story written, and a sense that the story came from deep inside me, not a product of my mind's imagination. It reminded me of what I’ve read about some painters: they are driven to keep working at a particular project and they need to keep at it until it is done.

But unlike painting, writing requires a person to get very involved with words and thoughts. And, for me, life still had to go on as usual. My job requires my full presence. Our family needed to eat and have clean clothes and such. So it was necessary for me to ensure that I stopped to breathe deep and centre myself. I often found myself repeating the reminder, “it’s a matter of the soul.”

I started writing on the first day of November, without a distinct plan other than a sense of what I needed to accomplish with the story. About mid-way I stopped paying attention to my word count. I had already told myself it didn’t matter what the numbers were, but still, it was getting in the way. My goal was to write a story, not to reach the 50,000 word goal that is built into the NaNoWriMo system. It helped to ignore the count of words. I kept writing, and when I worried about getting done or where the end of the story would be, I reminded myself that the story was coming from within and it would happen as it needed to. The story was finished on the last day of November!

During December I set the story aside, although I kept feeling it calling me back. I have work to do before I can share the story. At the end of December I took a quick look at the first scene, ready to start the process. I realized, as is true of every novel, that the beginning needs to be revised. But what I really need to do first is read through the entire story. I need to let it settle back into me, but now with some of the distance of being the reader and not just the writer immersed in the creative process.

I have written every November for the last eleven years. In that time, I have written novels, short stories, and poems. Some of them have been shared with a few people, but other than the poems I have posted here on my blog, nothing has been published, either formally or informally. I have the sense that everything I’ve written so far has been a part of the process for preparing me for this story. This story will be finished and shared, for any who wish to read it.