Butt in chair, hands on keyboard

It was Nov. 30, and the book was due.

My novel was under contract and the draft deadline happened to fall on Nov. 30. I had an outline and a number of scenes written, but I opted to use the succession of Nanowrimo events and the camaraderie of the local Nanowrimo participants as a catalyst for the final push on the draft.

The write-in that night took place at a county office acquired by one of the organizers. Dozens of writers plugged in their laptops at the long tables and pounded away to get all the words they could by midnight. There was laughter and a table full of snacks and an excited air of creativity and joy as we dove into the last big push toward 50,000 words.

Every few minutes, someone hit their goal and announced it to the room. And we all cheered, because this was not a contest, race or other competition as it has been described. It was a community of writers supporting each other in their dream.

I made my goal before 10 p.m. and the draft was done. They cheered for me. That draft went through its edits, was published and earlier this year it was re-released in its anniversary edition.

By now, most of what can be said about Nanowrimo’s incomprehensible choice to blow up their entire business model on the altar of AI has been said by people smarter than me. That’s not going…