Nervous-Breakdown November

I'm being cute. I have yet to have a nervous breakdown, and this surprises me. I used to have real anxiety issues dating all the way back to the third grade. I'm glad I've mellowed out a little bit. This month is a bit crazy, and I'd planned on updating this over Thanksgiving break; but after going to a Writing Center session on travel and blog writing, I was under the influence. So here I am, blogging, and simultaneously reading my travel journal from my trip to Europe two summers ago. And despite the fact that I pretty much did everything in this travel journal wrong (at least according to the session I attended) I'm still so glad I did it. It is the only real thing I have from it. My computer crashed not too long after my trip, so I had to excavate my half a thousand photos from my dying hard drive (and I didn't find them all) and lost all of my videos.

Anywho, I suppose I should say what's been happening in school. Well, as the end of the semester approaches, the work load is gradually getting heavier. I am Atlas with the world resting on my shoulders... though the world seems more to consist of papers and projects. But hey; that's college. That's my world. In my First Year Seminar, we just finished reading Dracula and Interview with the Vampire. I enjoyed both of them, and the impact of Dracula on me will be made evident later on in this post. But we are now preparing our theses for our final paper. This actually serves as a convenient segway... I plan on connecting vampires to Greek Mythology in my paper. There are a few very strong connections that I found. And this obviously wouldn't have seemed so obvious if I had not been taking a Greek History class. For that we also have a paper and an Athens Simulation this coming Thursday. Basically, we're doing a roleplay of the Assembly in Ancient Athens. I represent a Radical Democrat. Death to Socrates! Yeah.

Besides school, however, November is infamous for NaNoWriMo, or, National Novel Writing Month. This is my first year participating, and although I was late on the uptake, I've caught up for the most part. I have just about 28k words and counting. However, balancing study and "leisurely" writing (yeah right) sometimes gets tough. I have had the hardest time getting up in the mornings simply because I'm up from 8 to 2am most days, working, writing, working, writing. Sleep fits in there somewhere... so does eating. But that is irrelevant.

This is where that Dracula foreshadowing comes into play. For my story in particular, I'm trying to write it as a collection of entries. But, unlike Stoker's method of just using diary entries or recordings, I'm trying to incorporate as many mediums of communication as I can. I have letters, scripts, post-it notes, lists, school assignments, e-mails... needless to say, this makes writing all the more difficult. But my main priority was making it interesting to read, even if the storyline is still a bit shoddy (which it is. Thankfully NaNo encourages quantity, not quality). This is what Dracula did for me. It kept me on my toes with the constant changes of voice, and the variety was certainly welcomed by me. It kept the pace moving. I always wanted to know who was going to say/think what next. And, as tribute to Mr. Stoker for the inspiration, one my characters is named after his protagonist Jonathan Harker. Coincidentally -- I have seriously just realized this -- they both start graying in both his novel and mine. I sincerely did not realize this until just now. That's weird on so many levels. Oh well! He's more of a testament of my thanks to Stoker in that respect, I suppose. I had always planned for him to gray, but I'd given him the name Harker on a whim, thinking it would be nice to express some gratitude for Stoker.

My two other classes (Dramatic Writing and Psychology) are giving me a little bit of trouble. For Dramatic Writing, we have to write a one-act play that lasts for about a half hour. Now, I like my idea, but it just doesn't translate all the well into a play. I'm hoping that these next few drafts will spark something inside my brain. Psychology isn't too bad; the only thing I'm worried about is the final exam. It's cumulative; we didn't have a midterm to at least split the study load. I am perfectly okay with the conceptual ideas in the course; but the more biological things (like parts/functions of the brain and other such organs) aren't as easy for me. I'm hoping for the best, however. I'm not too pessimistic about it yet!

Anyone else participating in NaNoWriMo? How are things going for you? Feel free to add me as a Writing Buddy if you so wish.