My First Contest Win

Imagine my surprise when I opened the following link to the Missouri Literacy Festival http://www.missouriliteraryfestival.org/2011/09/22/missouri-literary-festival-announced-short-fiction-prize-winners/ and saw my name as a first runner up in the Missouri Writers competition and the winner of the Voters Choice competition. Maybe surprised is not the right word. Stunned, delirious, shocked. Yeah those are better descriptions of my reaction.
This was a story I actually wrote about ten years ago on a dare from a friend. He told me to write him a story about slavery and this is what I came up with. A story of a young girl suddenly torn from her family and bewildered by her circumstances.
When a writer friend of mine, Alice Cummings, http://havenovelwilledit.blogspot.com/ (who by the way placed second) told me about the contest back in June the first thing I thought of was this story. It'd been all but abandoned on my hard drive all these years and now was it's chance to see the light of day. All I wanted was somebody to read it, finally. Of course I hoped it was good enough for some sort of recognition. After all, that's why we enter contests isn't it? I made a few edits, sent it off with my entry fee and pretty much forgot about it until my writer friend informed me we were both finalists for the Voters Choice award.
I began a campaign, putting all my new found social networking skills to the test. I facebooked, I twittered, I inlisted co-workers, friends and both writer's groups I belong to. I was shameless. And it worked! It actually worked! I appreciate and thank all the people who voted for me.
But, I have to say I am most proud of the first runner up award. This means a panel of judges deemed my story good. Wow!

Changing Seasons

There's an old saying in the Ozarks. "If you don't like the weather today, stick around till tomorrow. It's sure to be different."  That's never been more true than the last few weeks. We've went from 100 degrees week before last to 55 degrees for the high yesterday. Brrrrr.
I don't like cold weather. I'm a summer child. Give me a warm sunny day anytime over the dreary, rainy fall day we had yesterday. Even after the extreme hot summer we experienced this year, I find myself longing for it to come back.
Which brings me to the real reason for this post. The changing seasons of our lives. The older I get the more I find myself longing for the days of Spring: the dream catcher days, and the rebirth of hope. When the lazy days of summer stretched before me like an ocean. When I had time on my side. "There's always tomorrow or next week or next year."
But, the tomorrows start getting fewer and fewer, and with each passing year, I feel time is not on my side. I don't even like to take naps because it's time lost that I could be doing something productive toward the realization of my dream.
Don't get me wrong. I still feel I have a lot of good years left but I find myself hoping the winter of my life doesn't come too soon. Give me a few more spring and summer days and yes even fall.

Is Anybody Out There?

Okay, I'm really new to this so I hope you'll bear with me through this whole learning curve thing. I am a writer (obviously). I have published an article and short story in the nineties. A poem in about 2003 and since then, I've been working on novels through National Novel Writing Month and learning as much as I can. I currently have a complete manuscript under consideration at a publishing house (fingers crossed, toes crossed, eyes crossed). I hope to post on here at least once a week, but I work a job job 40 hours of that week, so that doesn't leave much time. I will do my best. Thanks for visiting. I will be making improvements to my blog as I go.
Wanda Kay