Today is the day...
by Kimberley Allen McNamara
Today is the day…
In 2018, author Jami Attenberg launched what is now known as the #1000wordsofsummer initiative.
Basically, Attenberg announced on twitter:
“So I’m going to do a thing with a friend where we write at least 1000 words a day from June 15-29 and I will probably post word counts and if you want to play along and post yours let me know. Also maybe I will come up with a hashtag for it.”
A simple statement with an overwhelming outcome. Originally posted on Instagram, the response was immediately positive, people wanted to play. Attenberg cross posted it on Twitter (think of it as cross pollination) and the response was again overwhelmingly enthusiastic.
What began as a way of stating her intention to the social media universe as a means to motivate herself to write, became a sensation, a desire for accountability to show up and get the work done. As Attenberg admits writing is work, so if you approach it (the work) as a challenge or as an accountability then you are more apt to step up and meet that challenge, to be accountable. The accountability, Attenberg recognized was the appeal.
Fortunately, Attenberg also realized that to write 1000 a day, to commit to writing 1000 words a day would require a pep talk for many because for many, writing is something we mean to get to and often don’t, because writing isn’t our real job (parenting, motherhood, significant other commitments, the paying job that puts food on the table, they all demand and get precedence. Hence the daily email Attenberg sends out to all who sign up.
Each daily email begins with: Today you will write 1000 words.
And then Attenberg begins to tell you how and why you will do this - largely you will do it because those 1000 words need to come out, they need to occupy space, they deserve to occupy space, they deserve to be heard if only by you and your keyboard or the dog that you read them aloud to. Once you’ve written them, once they are out there, you will experience a lightness, a sense of accomplishment or a sense of frustration because they are not what you wanted but they are there and tomorrow is another day with another 1000 words that will possibly be better. This is called Hope.
My small writing group - (an off-shoot of a larger class I took at GrubStreet in Boston taught by author/instructor Annie Hartnett from September 2019 through June 2020) decided to accept the gauntlet thrown by Attenberg. For 14 days we would write or aspire to write 1000 words a day and post a word count in a group text. And we did. Each day our zoom organizer, would post the opening words of Attenberg’s email in a text and then say “Let’s Go!” Over the course of each day from 8 am until 12 midnight we’d text each other our word counts sometimes jubilant that words had just flowed other times stymied by the direction of the words or the lack of words that struggled to be put on the pages. When I texted: “only 543 words today” one of my group texted “there is no such thing as “only” when it comes to writing there is: I wrote 543 words! 543 words and you wrote them! It was true. Think of it, they weren’t there before today. Her text inspired me to write the next day not just the 1000 I signed up for but the remainder from the day before, my own personal tally sheet. I think of my tally sheet as sit-ups, if I say I’m going to do 50 and I only get 25 in on a given day either I get the 25 in that evening or add an additional 25 to the next day. One way or another the amount I committed too needs to be done. I have a preoccupation with making things “even” or balanced.
Attenberg’s daily emails for the three years she launched and has nurtured the 1000wordsofsummer may be found at: https://1000wordsofsummer.substack.com/ They are inspiring pep talks from a coach I picture walking the sideline clipboard in hand, a definite swagger in her step as she tells me to write the *@%*8# 1000 words. She is a fair and firm coach. She knows that we can do this. She offers up advice from another established author as further encouragement. But always Attenberg closes with her own bits of advice or commands: Write!, Courage, Write to the ding, Trust your brain….
1000wordsofsummer 2020 did not shy away from the outside world, from the heartache, the energy of protest, the sorrow of loss, the bewilderment of the pandemic ‘reopening’ or closing, the need for change, the need for diversity, for inclusion... The authors, who offered up bits of advice for Attenberg’s daily emails, also included a space where, should the reader/participant feel so inclined, they could make a donation to a cause the guest author held dear. Day 8 of 1000wordsofsummer 2020 was particularly poignant, it would have been Breonna Taylor’s 27th birthday and Jami reminded us all of this with a link to learn about Breonna Taylor, to sign the petition on Breonna’s behalf, on that day, Jami’s closing was gentle: Open hearts today.
What began as a self-motivation became an energy that both inspired and grew because of and for each other. Other people, other writers, helped to foster and nurture each other’s work. Attenberg created a community.
Perhaps, what Attenberg found and shared is what Sarah Manguso notes in her nonfiction piece Perfection as printed in the Paris Review (a quote scrawled to our group text for inspiration) :
“One day I realized I could just write the first line of a book over and over again, each time differently, and so write an entire book.
How far along are you? people will ask of your book, as if the page count indicates anything, but progress on a book isn’t linear. It’s oceanic.”
That word, oceanic. Consider it. Writing is not linear and a life cannot be explained well by a linear statement of facts alone. Writing is oceanic. Sometimes all you can do is tread water, sometimes you can only see the horizon, but those 1000 words are bringing you closer to the goal and some day soon land will be in sight.
Attenberg gave us the tools to keep writing, and our group is doing just that. We scour her email archives, we look for inspiration in other writers (see Manguso passage above) and we keep at it.
So, if you’ll excuse me, I have my #1000wordsofsummer to write...
link to picture: https://tinyurl.com/yas6ywvk
