Short story competition

As you’re aware I attend several local writing groups – each of which differs in its structure, format and organised events. Two of the groups have an calendar of writing competitions where a prompt or theme is given and the members create whatever is required be it a poem, an article or a short story. Last night, was the dead line for the annual short story competition.

For the last four weeks, I have been tinkering with an idea off and on. I’d written the first draft and was happy with the raw details but over time my editing had flattened the spirit of the piece. Sadly, I did that fateful thing of ignoring the piece hoping to return but actively avoiding it - knowing I wasn’t happy with the direction my editing had taken it. Basically, my short story had entered the ‘messy’ zone where I needed to work hard to polish it and bring it back to life – which can take time and constant rereading. A danger zone for me. The easiest option was to not enter the competition. But I wanted to. I haven’t entered any of their competitions before and having been a member for eighteen months felt that I really ought to. 

Sunday night, I worked on the piece but didn’t feel my effort was reflected in the version saved to my laptop. Monday morning, on rereading the short story - I decided not to enter the competition. But all day my conscience was nagging at me ‘you really ought to try’. Tuesday morning, I got up extra early and was determined that come what may I would enter the piece, as I liked the original idea which fitted the theme perfectly. I had until five o’clock to sort out the ‘messy’ version. I needed to hand the competition piece in at the evening’s meeting. I worked my little socks off crafting and creating until the messy mess was refined and refreshingly like I’d originally imagined. I don’t have a printer at home so used my local library to print the polished piece, hence the five o’clock deadline. And at seven thirty, I proudly presented our group’s chairman with my anonymous entry for judging by a nominated third party. I’d done it! 

I’ve just reread the piece to myself. I’m pretty pleased with my efforts, though I’m not pleased with my ‘flip flopping’ whilst creating it but I’m chuffed with the end result. We have one month to wait for the results to be announced – so I shall let you know in due course. 

In the meantime, I’ll start another competition piece and promise myself to avoid the ‘flip flopping’ scenario by ploughing on with the piece. 

Update 30th April: My story wasn't placed by the competition judge but I took delight in that the writing group enjoyed my story when I read it aloud on results night. I'm glad I entered as it gave me a slightly different focus for a period of time.

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