November is a liminal month.

The mornings are frosty, the afternoons crisp. Some people still have their Halloween decorations out—pumpkins slowly collapsing in on themselves like Compo from Last of the Summer Wine—and others already have their Christmas decorations once. NEXT is playing ‘Jingle Bells’ in stores and some aggrieved emo teenager shuffles between racks of sequin as she aggrievedly repeats, “Does anyone remember it’s November?!”

And, of course, to anyone doing nanowrimo November is the month they go from 0 words to 50,000. Hopefully! If they get a wriggle on. The aim for today is 16,600 words, give or take. I am WAY behind because there’s been a lot going on today, but I’m counting the words for this…which is why I waxed lyrical about November earlier.

I’ve talked before about whether nano is good for writers or not…

OK, I will get back to that. But I am watching Live at the Apollo and not really paying that much attention…which I am kicking myself for because the most spectacularly good looking comedian just walked on stage. I’ve no idea what his name is, but I literally lost my train of thought mid-sentence. My fingers just literally stalled out on the keyboard! (Will update at the end if I find out his name).

So, where were we. Nanowrimo may or may not be good for writers (and may or may not be pain in the ass for agents!), but I want to talk about why it’s been good for me this year.

If I am honest the whole of 2021 has passed in a vaguely disconnected haze. My only anchor to the commonly accepted passage of time has been a few grimly clung to dates. Birthdays. Deadlines.

Am I depressed. Yes. It’s fine. It’s not bad. The brain worms are just worming. They do that. It’s not actually a terrible feeling. It’s not really a feeling at all. It’s being untethered from stuff. Except extremely hot comedians, apparently!

I can’t believe I was distracted from talking about being depressed by some guy just because he’s hot and funny. …OK, we can all believe that of me. Still. Do I not take my own brain seriously? Well, maybe I would if it tried harder at chemistry! Seriously though, if anyone is worried. I’m ok. It’s been better, but it’s been a lot worse too. I know where the problem line is. I am careful not to go over it without acquiring external help.

It’s just…drawn out this time by the lack of impactful scehdules for me to follow. I’ve not got anything to plan around or need to pay attention to. So I just drift along, doing just enough to get by, and then scrabble when the cut off date looms ahead of me.

Nanowrimo gives me the opportunity for a reset of a sort. Every day has a word count and a deadline. People care, if only in the abstract, if I hit my daily target. Every day is pinned down to a particular accomplishment I need to hit, or tomorrow will be harder. It’s been good for me so far.

I’m feeling more concrete, if that makes sense.

Anyhow, November is a liminal month. At the end of it we’re going to be somewhere else and, well, not someone else but hopefully the same person in a better mood. I don’t think even the most cheerful and emotionally secure among us would turn that down. Hopefully I’ll also be a person who’s written 50,000 words in a month again!

And for the record it was Darren Harriott and he was in a much tighter t-shirt than in this clip.