I finally did it, and with an hour to spare. The third time was definitely the charm, and things were looking a little iffy for awhile. I was about 5,800 words down going into the final day, but somehow rallied late and finished faster than I thought I would.
Now what? To be honest, though I finished NaNoWriMo, my novel is only 2/3rd's of the way to its own goal line. I figure if I crank out about 1,000 words a day, I should be able to hang up the first draft of this novel before Christmas. What a gift that would be to myself. I know that a first draft is a lumpy and awkward pile of shit that needs to be dug through to find the gold hidden inside. It will take numerous rewrites, extra drafts, and a lot of cutting and stitching to get this thing to a place where it would be readable to other eyes than my own.
Regardless of all that is in front of me in this novel, I was pretty damn excited to have gotten across that finish line. Some celebration was in order. I rewarded myself with a bottle of Crispin Stagger Lee rye whiskey cask aged cider, a slice of lemon poppy seed cake, and hunkering down on the couch with my wife and watching my new favorite show, American Horror Story.
I will let you know how things go, but in the meantime, I found a great blog post by Chuck Wendig that enlightened me as to where I go after a first draft here.
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