I can’t resist one more plug for National Novel Writing Month, which starts at MIDNIGHT TOMORROW! (Yep, somehow midnight on Halloween night seems very fitting.)

Even though I’m very sad about not doing it this year myself, NaNoWriMo was one of the key things that taught me how to start fighting back against my perfectionism when I first participated in November of 2005.

I’ve done it three times since then, and successfully completed a horribly raw and unedited 50,000-word novel twice. And I don’t think I’ve ever found a better—or more fun—crash course in how to throw your inner critic out the window (or at least lock her/him in a closet for a while).

So it’s worth stating again how heartily I endorse this program. If you’ve never heard of it and you’re intrigued, or if you have and you’re on the fence about participating, NOW is the time . . . because it won’t come around again for another year!

If you have specific questions I can answer about NaNoWriMo for you, feel free to post them in the comments below or send me a private e-mail at the address in the very bottom line of my “About Me” page. I’ll make a point of checking that at least a few times today and tomorrow.

I also want to make two offers for anyone who’d like to get involved . . .

If you do NaNoWriMo this November and would like a personal cheerleader, I’d be happy to be your NaNoBuddy via e-mail. You can send me your word counts if you want to keep yourself gently . . . ac-count-able (heh). Or you can just check in with me and tell me how it’s going, and I can reply with hearty cheering-you-on messages and any advice I can offer.

If you’d like to be part of this adventure of literary and creative abandon, but don’t want to actually, you know, write a novel, consider making a tax-deductible donation to the Office of Letters and Light, the parent non-profit which runs NaNoWriMo and other beneficial programs—many for children.

There’s something in it for you if you do, hopefully. A very good friend of mine is doing NaNo (again!) and she’s personally raising funds to get into a special Write-a-Thon here in San Francisco on November 22. If she makes her stated goal, she will not only get in herself, but she’ll be able to bring one guest.

That will be me.

If she raises enough to qualify us both to attend the third annual “Night of Writing Dangerously,” I promise to blog from there and give you an insider’s view of the unbridled thrills and excitement. Maybe I can even take a little videocam, record a few brief interviews with other writers, and post them here. (I haven’t included a video in a blog post yet! Hmmm . . .)

Oh, if you’d like to donate, you might want the link:

Donate to my writerly friend’s NaNoWriMo fundraising page here! Just click the link and then the “Sponsor Me” button (after reading her lovely page, of course).

So there you have it, ladies and gents.

A fantastic month-long chance to play with imperfection begins tomorrow.

You can join in if you’re inspired to.

If you do, you can take me up on my offer to be your NaNoBuddy.

And/or you can donate to the cause and hopefully get me in the door to blog from the Write-a-Thon itself.

Or none of the above. Of course it’s up to you. But I couldn’t resist one more reminder that NaNoWriMo 2009 starts at MIDNIGHT TOMORROW! )

I was going to write about something else today, but Chris Zydel’s wonderful post changed my mind. Check it out—she talks about why reframing the whole concept of making mistakes is a very good idea. I love her weed analogy. And her allusion to the doctrine of the Church of Mistakes. I know I’m a member of that congregation.

Chris reminds us how important it is to remember to be kind to yourself when you make mistakes and things don’t turn out the way your judgmental mind hoped they would. It’s also helpful to remember the good that can come out of your mistakes (or the things you think are mistakes). Like learning. New insights.

And sometimes, the Happy Accident.

One of my favorite Winnie-the-Pooh stories (I almost typed “when I was a kid,” then I realized it’s still one of my favorite Pooh stories) is the one about Eeyore’s birthday. Eeyore, as you may remember, is a rather gloomy and depressed donkey. He doesn’t expect much from life, so “not much” is usually what he gets. One year on his birthday, Pooh and Piglet each bring him a birthday present. Pooh’s gift is a jar of honey, which he (being a Bear of Very Little Impulse Control When it Comes to Hunny) unthinkingly eats along the way. Piglet’s gift is a big red balloon, which he falls upon and bursts while running to Eeyore’s place.

Each presents his gift rather shamefacedly, but Eeyore is entranced by the way the burst balloon fits into the pot perfectly. Pooh and Piglet leave him happily dropping the balloon into the honey pot, then pulling it out again, then dropping it in again . . .

Quite by accident, they had given Eeyore the best birthday present ever.

I remember a happy accident of my own. One year during college, I stayed in town for the summer semester. I’d been working hard on my honors thesis and other very cerebral matters of (*cough*) lofty import (*cough*), so I decided to get my hands into some soothing, 100% physical clay. I took a wheel-thrown pottery class and had a blast—so much that I frequently went to the studio after hours to practice on my own.

One day I decided to use the big, heavy kick wheel (where you kick a very heavy round stone attached by a vertical axle to the potter’s wheel, making them rotate together) rather than one of the electric ones (where you step on a pedal to make the wheel spin, and the speed varies with your foot pressure). I’d never used the kick wheel before, so I intended to make a simple bowl.

As I worked the clay, it collapsed too far inward. At first I was upset, but then wondered what else the clay might want to become. It turned (pun absolutely intended) out to be the best mug I ever made, and I still drink out of it today. It’s not perfect—I didn’t know much about making handles, so my mug handle is sort of fragile and irregular-looking.

But because of its beginnings as a proto-bowl, my mug has a very thick bottom. Coupled with the inward-curving sides, it holds heat like no other mug I’ve owned. And there’s nothing like the pleasure of sipping hot tea or coffee from a piece of pottery you’ve thrown, glazed, and fired yourself. It means more to me than any “perfect” commercially produced mug I could buy from a store.

What kinds of happy accidents have you had? I’d love to hear about them!