That whole Ficlet Friday experiment? Yeah, it was fun while it lasted but it seems as though I, along with everyone else, let it whither in the Summer Sun.

Sorry. If I’m blogging about writing – fiction writing – don’t deny me an allusion.

Cut to last night’s iPhone/iTunes update. I get an email from Chris @ NaNoWriMo about some site upgrade or another and it reminds me that while we may be 7 weeks away from the general election, we’re closer still to the start of NaNoWriMo.

And this is the year I finish.
This is the year I write like I’ve been exercising: daily
This is the year it goes into a document, not into the void or a dream or a lazy cubicle chat with a colleague.

Rather than continue making declarative statements that may not come true, I’ll link to a Psychology Today piece on creativity that induced both head-shaking agreement and head-shaking bewilderment. Why are creatives (and I’m being generous to lump myself in here) such dichotomies?

So how should I harness these dual impulses inside me to create … whatever it is I’m creating.

Art?
A novel? (Hopefully)
Prose?
This blog post? (Definitely)

I’m thinking the solution, which came to me via Bump, is going to be Evernote.

Simple.
Multi-purpose (good for grocery lists AND late-night ideas).
Multi-platform (Web & iPhone app)

Here’s the first “creative” thing I’ve captured using Evernote. Let’s hope I give it enough food and water to grow:

The fight isn’t the last stand
It’s the first stanza

Granted it’s only a fragment, a strand, a shard of an inkling of something larger, but I like it. For the moment.

My point is that at least the moment was captured. If I revise or delete or reverse or reconfigure later, the fact remains that I had the raw materials to begin with.

While I may feel sorry – surprisingly not too much – about the Ficlet Fridays petering out, I’m happy that, for the first time, I’m confident and assured by some semblance of process going in to NaNoWriMo.

More as I create more.

Happy Hump Day!