NaNoWriMo to Grant Birthday Wish

The gods of National Novel Writing Month (NaNoWriMo) will be with many next month, hovering in their minds and creaked necks - their raw mouse wrists - as they attempt to write 50,000 words in 30 days. That's approximately 5.5 pages per day to reach the goal of having a 175-page work of fiction in hand by November 30, midnight.

Thirty days and 30 nights of literary abandon, they say. Freakish novel writing for an amateur at best, I say. But if the body gods will carry me 26.2 miles without forsaking me, maybe the NaNoWriMo gods won't either.

A week ago, I turned 28. The Day of Disappointment in the Seventh-day Adventist histories. My parents even picked the date. So did the Adventists. Growing up, every school morning devotional with my mom and brother over orange juice or cocoa and bread, which landed on my birthday, had the Great Disappointment as the topic of choice. No cool story about Susie's stolen ice skates or Robbie not giving in to peer pressure. Nope. Just about how we got it wrong.

My birthday sometimes turns into a disappointment. Because I have such grandiose expectations like zero zits and double rainbows. I love surprises and gifts, sweet text messages and cards. I love flowers and jelly beans and signs the people I love GET me. I love that most remember and mark the day of our birth as special, something worth celebrating, indulging. It's a day to be alive. A reason to paint your fingernails or get a haircut, drink an entire bottle of wine or spend 13 hours fishing.

Self-oil-changing on base

It seems like we're always on a budget though. Because we are. But this year we drove down to Destin - for dinner and music on a boat covered in white lights; it motors out of the bay and into the Gulf in a perfect line, to avoid the water sometimes only 3-feet deep. The invisible canal is marked with red lights on the left, green on right. Each light post has a pelican sitting on it, camped out for the night, the red or green glow shining through its thin bird feet. Watching this from the decks is the best part of the booze cruise for 80-year-olds.

Cary is going home to California before his primary training starts immediately after Thanksgiving. I’m staying home in Pensacola, taking my new Mac mini, double monitor setup - with a Bootcamp PC tucked safely inside for work - for a true spin. Working and writing. Zero distractions. Probably home for the entire series of winter holidays due to few frequent flyer seats and Cary’s devildarned schedule. The holidays will be prolific.

It may be a while before the blog is blogged. The wannabe book will take priority. But if the dreaming well is dry, and the creaks and wrists become too testy, it may be time for some keyboard lifting and non-novella words. Besides, where else does one write about the Lost in Translation wig for Halloween, or the plans to whisk Cary away to Disneyworld with whiskey, or to one of the last launches of the space program. Where else would the logs of life be published without strenuousness or compromise.

But the smell of a blown out birthday candle is one of my favorites. Time to make my own wish come true, 3 days and counting. Then lift-off.