This is so typical of the scraps to which writers must cling in order to convince themselves that they are writers, and not hobbyists or imposters. I don’t know why actors have no problem with this. An actor may never have had a gig in his or her entire life, but she will still proudly call herself an actor. Writers are almost the opposite: we can’t even begin to call ourselves writers without feeling a sense of shame and braggadocio. The best description I read was in the Times — might have been the magazine section — where the very astute writer observed that writers must look to the tiniest of accomplishments: “I wrote a line for a movie;” “I got a job teaching at a community writing center;” or, in my case, “Once, I was a finalist in a New Millennium Fiction Award.
The prize for being a finalist in the 39th season was a copy of the anthology where all the first place winners works were published, and where the finalists’ names appeared on one of the pages. The thing is, I don’t know what story I submitted. I think the contest (it happened twice a year) was in 2015 or 2016. I suspect it was a story I wrote about a woman whose mother possibly kidnapped her from her father when she was a toddler, and then lived their lives on the run from the law and capture.
But I’m sure it made me happy at the time. Little things.