Camp Pep: No Metaphors, All Business

There’s just a little bit of time left in April, but Camp NaNoWriMo isn’t over yet! For everyone still writing, imagining, or recovering, Chris Angotti, director of programs, delivers some pep  (Above: The NaNo Boston crew. Photo taken by travlarkboston.):

This isn’t going to be one of those Camp pep talks with a bunch of metaphors about climbing mountains, rowing boats, or evading sasquatch. We love our outdoorsy symbologies, but I’ll bet—in these waning hours of April—they’re not what you need right now.

It’s time to stop messing around and get serious. Like, “Why do none of these freaking dictionaries include the plural of ‘sasquatch’?” serious.

So you, with the few (or several) thousand words to go:

You’ve made it a long way. We’re proud of that and we hope you are, too. It would be straight-up crazy for you not to mash on the gas and finish this race. (See how far away we are from camp metaphors?)

Stay up late, get up early, call out of work, drop the kids off at Chuck E. Cheese with $60 in tokens—whatever it takes for you to hit your goal and type “The End.”

And you, with those scant pages written the first week of April:

Okay, you haven’t made it so far. But you had an idea, and probably a good one. That puts you in the tiny, bright creative sliver of this world, and we want you to stay there.

Spend these last days working just a little more. Ignore the goal if you need to, and just focus on moving your story along. It’ll get to where it needs to be eventually, I promise.

Finally you, the one who’s already celebrated an April triumph:

Good job. Now, we’ve got an important assignment for you:

Cheer on your fellow Campers. Take to your cabin, to Facebook, to Twitter, to the NaNoWriMo forums and say, “I did this and you can, too! We’re in this together, and I’ll even send you that $60 for your kids to use at Chuck E. Cheese.” (Okay, maybe not the last part.)

Our programs work because of this community—the thousands of writers sharing the same challenge and rooting each other on. We’re all part of that little sliver I mentioned, and we owe it to one another to keep shining.

The metaphors we use in our pep talks don’t matter. It’s the love, the process, and the people that really count.

Let’s finish together.

Chris Angotti

Official word-count validation has begun! Make sure to claim your win (and some awesome winner goodies) by following these steps.