If you spend time on social media, you probably know all about the November memes. First, there’s the gratitude challenge, which I don’t participate in but find lovely, because I think it’s really meaningful for people who chose to name the things they’re thankful for during the month. Then there’s Movember, which I also don’t participate in, because I’m unable to grow facial hair. While the sentiment behind it (promoting men’s health) is also lovely, I’m always a little glad when December comes along and all the men I know shave their squirrelly little beards and wispy mustaches. And then there’s the one that turns my veins to ice: NaNoWriMo, aka National Novel Writing month, aka the month in which I feel intense guilt.

In theory, I should love NaNoWriMo. Back when I was in grad school, I wrote two novels (which are both stored on a flash drive in a drawer in my desk and have never seen the light of day since). I’m even working on a novel right now (who isn’t?). And if I do say so myself, it’s a pretty great idea– just the kind of book I want to read– a complicated family drama with a central event that’s close to my heart.

But actually sitting down and writing it? I’m not so good at that part.

I just finished reading Elizabeth Gilbert’s book Big Magic, which is pretty much the best inspirational book ever written for people who aspire to be novelists, and she wrote a story that has kept me up at night worrying (but not writing, unfortunately). She tells of a time when she had a fabulous idea for a novel about a secretary from Minnesota who was sent to the Brazilian rainforest to bail out her boss from a dangerous and mysterious situation. However, Gilbert’s life got complicated and she ended up writing something else instead, and when she came back to the book, her inspiration was gone. A little while later, she met the author Ann Patchett for the first time, and Patchett started talking about a project she was working on–a secretary from Minnesota who was sent to the Brazilian rainforest to bail out her boss from a dangerous and mysterious situation. As Gilbert explains it, the inspiration jumped. As many of you know, the result was Patchett’s fabulous State of Wonder (the best book of 2011, in my opinion).

While this story may be inspirational to some people. It frankly scared the snot out of me. I try to set aside an hour, three mornings a week, to work on my novel. And invariably, something encroaches. A sick kid. An orthodontist appointment. Papers that need to be graded. A basement in such a state of entropy that it will literally make me insane to leave it that way one second longer. A canyon that’s so beautiful I have to take just one more run before the snow falls.

So what’s an aspiring writer to do? I get a vision in my mind of my arm protectively shielding my laptop, while all the other responsibilities of the world threaten to close in. And I’m failing, you guys. I have this beautiful, messed up young mother whose story I feel such a responsibility to shepherd, and I can’t even give her three hours a week. I already know the tricks. I already get up at 5am. By 10pm (when my house is relatively quiet), I have nothing left to give. I don’t expect perfection. I have toddlers and teenagers, so I’m burning the candle at both ends. I would reward myself with chocolate or diet coke or new running shoes if I actually did the writing.

So I’m being totally self-indulgent and asking you. What gets you writing? Does NaNoWriMo? How do you make it work? How does anyone who tries to write without a room of her own actually make it happen?