Back in June I wrote a 1,000 word story for the NYC Midnight Flash Fiction Contest. I wrote about that here and here. The way it works is that they put all of the participants into groups of around 35 and gave each group a genre, location, and word. Everyone had 48 hours to turn in a completed story. The top 15 receive points based on their rank determined by judges. Everyone participates in round 2, with their same group. Again, the top 15 get points based on their rank. The points from both rounds are combined to determine which participants move on to the 3rd round.
I felt like a complete imposter and was certain that my story was not good enough to place in the top 15 for my group. My story was written for a young audience and I worried that the judges would find it too simple. Round 2 begins tonight at midnight (11:00 for my timezone). They finally sent out the results late last night and I read the email this morning. I got 9th place for my group! I am shocked and pleased. I’d been dreading the second round, thinking there was no point in my attempting to torture myself through writing another short story. They haven’t sent the judges’ feedback yet, but say they will have it to us before the contest starts tonight. I’m not sure if it would be good for me to read the feedback before writing or not.
Because I know that I tend to focus on the criticism more than any positives I receive. I don’t know if reading the judges’ negatives will just make me feel like even more of an imposter even if I did get 9th place. I mean, it doesn’t necessarily mean my writing was good if there were 30 crappy writers in my group. See what I’m doing? I am looking for the negative. I really need to stop that.
Anyway, this post is supposed to be about the GREAT start to my day, not my long string of “what ifs” for the weekend.
The other part of the morning that helped make it a great day is that I tested negative on a Covid test! While today is the 10th day of my second wave of Covid, I decided to test so that if it was negative my husband could actually sleep in our bed tonight. It’s been 16 nights that he’s had to sleep on the couch. With the negative result, I feel like it’s okay for him to come back to our bed tonight instead of tomorrow. I also felt safe taking off the mask when I was out of my room and I got to hug my kids!! I will still wear my mask to the doctor’s office today (postponed follow up for my wrist surgery), but I’m so glad to be done with wearing the mask in my own house.
I’ve started a morning routine the last few days. When the kids’ bus pulls away from the stop, I take a 30 minute brisk walk (1.6ish miles). I hope to continue to walk every week day and increase the time/distance as it gets cooler. I haven’t been able to do my regular workouts because of my wrist, but at least I can get some cardio in. I really need to get my weight back down so that I don’t have to buy new clothes! I think I may have to start physical therapy for my wrist, as it’s not nearly as flexible as it once was and I still have quite a bit of pain. If I can get at least back to where I was before surgery I would be happy, though it would be nice if I could get back to before I broke it in the first place!
I’m hopeful that the good morning will continue into the afternoon and the rest of the month! It’s such a relief to no longer be isolated from my family!!
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