Notes on the Clarion Write-a-Thon

From June 23 to August 3 I took part in the Clarion-Write-a-Thon. It’s a pretty informal thing, basically a balm for Clarion rejects to soothe their wounded egos (speaking from my own experience), but it also works as a good imperative to get some writing done, especially during the height of summer when the water and sun call for you. You set your own goal (mine was to write a short story each week and to write a movie script) and, if you want, donate money to Clarion. That’s it. It doesn’t really offer too much that you couldn’t do on your own, with you setting up your own time limit and goals and subbing in your favourite charity for Clarion.

But as a writer I am often looking for a community of other writers, so I gave the Write-a-Thon a go. It was surprisingly effective. I wrote five short stories and did a lot of planning for my movie script (all right, when I say surprisingly effective, I mean that I met roughly half of my stated goals. I didn’t write a short story for that last week because I was hit by a nasty ear infection, and as for the movie script…I’m working on it).

Doing the Write-a-Thon made me realize that I had not been taking my writing seriously. Having set goals made it seem like more of a job than a preoccupation. Saying something feels like work is usually a slam against it, but that’s not the case here. For me, making my writing feel like work gave me a sense of satisfaction that I didn’t have before, made my accomplishments measurable.

The other thing that gave me motivation was that a sponsor (okay, so it was my mom) donated money to Clarion on my behalf. Knowing that someone believed in me enough to put money down made me take the Write-a-Thon seriously. Thanks mom!