I was contacted a couple days ago by the guy who runs www.storyhouse.org. He wanted to verify that I was not a professional writer (couldn’t he tell by my writing?) as the judging for their animal nonfiction short story contest for newish writers was nearing the end. Putting 2 & 2 together to get … 4, right, definitely 4, I deduced I may be in the running to win the contest, which would get me … what? I really didn’t remember and didn’t care enough to look. And then today, I got the email notifying me that although I didn’t take first, and I was also not the runner-up, I was a finalist.
Quick, someone get me my sister to kiss. I guess I should be flattered. I threw the story together pretty fast, and it’s really the only nonfiction story I’ve ever written. If you care to read it, click this link.
But did I win anything as a finalist? Oh, I won something all right.
I am anxiously monitoring my email every 5 minutes for the arrival of my finalist prize. I was told that “There is no cash prize, but there is a certificate of achievement so you can remember this honor later on. As for the certificate. I will send a PDF file which you can print for yourself.”
What am I, a third grader? What am I going to do with that certificate? I can tell you one thing for sure I won’t do. Print it out.
There were a couple positives that came out of this experience. First, I discovered I can write nonfiction. I have a supposedly humorous nonfiction book about aging at least halfway done that is terrible. Just godawful. I decided it is nothing more than a litany of complaints from an old man who doesn’t want to be old. Nobody wants to read that. Even I didn’t like to read it to edit it. But I like the concept of the book, and I think I can rewrite the terribleness out of it.
And today was deadline day to submit a humorous story to a contest. I was hemming & hawing about what story to submit and if any were funny or good enough. As I was stalling, I got the finalist email, and that was the kick in the pants I needed to select a story and enter it.
As for all the other kicks in the pants, please stop.
Jim Flanigan Looks at the World 