In the early years of my writing, when I was first learning about discipline and obsession, I became very faithful to my schedule. Having come to writing from working in a law firm, where my time was measured out in tenth of an hour doses, and being the busy mother of two small boys, my writing time was limited and I knew I had to make it count. I had thought that I could write while the boys napped--very optimistic of me. I quickly discovered that their schedules rarely synchronized, and that I was most likely to have pieces of available time when they were with a babysitter.

When I did have time to be at my desk, I was obsessive about being sure that I stayed there and made the time count. I'd assign myself a number of pages or a number of words that had to be accomplished that day, and wouldn't leave my chair until I reached that goal. During my ten years in the unpublished writer's corner, I got very good at discipline and a whole lot better at my craft. The boys got older and went to school. And with three unpublished novels in the drawer, I had learned to write. I happily settled into a routine where I would write while they were in school, and then shove the stories away while I drove them to little league or karate, while I coached soccer, and while I perfected my role as the homework police.

Along the way, I learned that the process was different for each book. While storycraft and discipline were fundamental, each individual story and set of characters seemed to have their own rhythm. Sometimes a book would take a nice, tight nine months from start to finish and just seem to work. Another book would take a year and a half and some days feel like I was dragging out each word and nailing it to the page so it would stay there while I went back and got another word to go with it. Sometimes the plot that I'd worked out in my head before I began the book would stay the same; sometimes my characters, those willful creatures of my imagination, would start acting up and take the book in an entirely new direction. I learned to listen to my characters and trust them when they were being willful. I learned that at some point, in most books, I would lose my way--usually somewhere between chapter sixteen and chapter nineteen--and that eventually this would sort itself out and the book would get finished.

Writing is a solitary occupation. It requires many, many hours spent all alone, in a room, living in your head. I turned out to be good at that. Possibly I have a low thirst for living. Certainly I can spend six to ten hours a day at my desk, year after year, and not feel deprived or lonely. I have learned that I have to cut the cord and leave the desk from time to time. And I also learned--most surprising of all--that though we become writers because we have a great capacity for solitude, once we are published, we are suddenly expected to become charming and polished public speakers. Outgoing. Articulate. Interesting. This can require a major mental shift, from that tight cocoon of writer and keyboard and imagination and character's voices inside the head, to an audience that needs to be entertained and enticed to buy a book.

One of the most frequent comments I heard, when I joined the traveling author's circuit, was from people who used to say: "I've always wanted to write a book, and someday, when I have a free weekend, I'm going to." That really pushed my buttons. Here I was, day after day, month after month, and year after year, sitting there in my chair, trying to craft compelling fiction, and these people were going to do it in a weekend. Admittedly, everyone's process is different. There are authors who write much faster than I do. But  I began to wonder how fast I could write a novel if I really pushed myself hard. Then came the empty nest shocker, and it pushed me over the edge. My older son was leaving for college. The younger, seeing that he was going to be left home alone with the homework police, promptly started applying to boarding schools, and within three weeks, I had one at Wesleyan and the other at Exeter.

At first,I used to stand in their rooms and snivel. But we old yankees aren't really the  sniveling type, and so I took a deep breath, and that January, I decided to see how fast I could write a novel. I wrote ten to twelve hours a day, every day, and in 4 1/2 months, I'd written a 485 page police procedural. It was as close as I've come to an ecstatic state in my writing. I lived and breathed that novel. Went eagerly to my desk every day to see what my characters were up to. And when it was done, when I'd typed THE END, and assumed I would go back to my usual, more rational, schedule, I realized that I was lonely and sad. I had become so obsessed with my characters, so close to them after spending every waking moment with them for months, that when the book was done, I felt like they'd deserted me. A few months later, I had to start the second book in the series so I could go back and spend more time with them.

After my taste of obsession, I became more rational. Life, in the form of my mother's stroke and slow decline, and a 2 1/2 year project co-writing a true crime, made more demands on my time. I learned to balance my love of gardening and cooking with my love for living inside my head. But the urge toward obsession is always there. I am absolutely rapt when I can live in story, when the plot unfolds and the characters reveal themselves, and I can see it all unreeling in my mind.

Which brings us to National Novel Writing Month. I've just come into the end zone on a lengthy edit of a suspense novel. I've lost all perspective, and while I love the book, I can't tell whether it is good or not. (If someone would volunteer to read it on screen, I'd be thrilled) I thought NaNoWriMo would be the perfect way to practice a little controlled obsession and put some space between me and this book. Instead of starting something new, I decided it would be fun to dust off a partly written novel from the past. So, for the first three days of November, I reread the first eighteen chapters of this unfinished book. It's not a mystery. Indeed, I'm not sure I know what it is. Perhaps it is a fairy tale. Perhaps it's romantic suspense. Probably it will never see the light of day. But as I reread those long ago chapters, I found I was totally caught up in the story again. I wanted to rush through meals, skip grocery shopping, blow off going to the gym, so that I could sit here and read.

But this is an unfinished novel. And I'm not an outliner, so I have no notes from when I was creating this story to tell me where I'm supposed to go next. So here I sit, on the 4th day of NaNoWriMo. I have no idea where to go next. I can't remember who Cousin Severin, who just rang the doorbell, is. Harry's in the hospital, having been poisoned, and I'm hoping he'll be okay. I don't know if Alicia is mean and petty or downright dangerous. Whether Mrs. Whitfield will survive until the wedding. And whether Detective Garrity will show up and ruin everything, spoiling Tommy and Callie's second chance for happiness.

It should be an interesting month.