The Horrifying Writer’s Contest

Why the heck did I enter?

I never enter contests, especially if it has anything to do with writing. Writing, to me, has never been about competition. It’s about artistic expression, for crying out loud. There should be no prizes for writing. Writing is the prize!

But when I heard about this certain writing contest I happened to be in a low point of self evaluation. I felt I wasn’t living up to my ideals and I needed a challenge. I like to challenge myself. Some may call it masochism. Whatever.

So I entered the contest and then I learned the rules…

The contest called for writing a short story in three hours or less. No advanced technology was allowed; no smart phone, no tablet, no laptop, no computer. The short story had to be written by hand in a spiral notebook. And it had to be written while sitting in a crowded diner while drinking coffee.

Wow, I had never heard of such rules before!

Seriously.

The first problem that jumped out at me was the coffee. I don’t drink coffee. Okay, I drink between two and five cups of coffee a year — which many years ago used to be how much coffee I drank in a day. But I gave up coffee around fifteen years ago. This was obviously a problem.

The next problem was the requisite writing by hand. Back when I was really young my right hand had big ugly callouses on it from writing by hand. They were huge and off-putting. It was because I wrote by hand like a maniac. But I haven’t written by hand in around a quarter of a century. My right hand now is callous-free and the skin is smooth and pretty — in my opinion. For the last quarter of a century I’ve been writing by fingertip on a keyboard. I wasn’t even sure if I remembered how to write by hand.

The third problem was the diner. Who the bloody heck writes in a crowded diner while drinking coffee? I mean, seriously?! I do 117% of all my writing in absolute solitude. I can’t even imagine writing with anyone else in the room. Writing in public is like masturbating in public. Who does such a disgusting thing?

The writing contest didn’t seem very doable to me. It was ridiculous and went against everything I believe in. But I felt the need to win something. In our society today winning is everything. One is not allowed to feel good about themselves unless they are a winner. So I entered the writing contest.

To my delight I learned that there were only two other writers who entered the contest. The odds, if nothing else, seemed positive.

Before I go on I should point out that there were a couple of additional rules. First of all, there would be unidentified people seated throughout the diner who were tasked with watching the three writers to make sure they complied with the rules.

Furthermore, it was a stated rule that as we sat in our booths writing while drinking coffee and possibly having lunch if anyone should approach our booth and invite themselves to sit down and talk to us while we wrote we could not decline the invitation.

The three contestants included me, a young thirty-something woman named Eloisa, and a forty-something man named Chad.

We entered the diner at the same time and as we sat down at separate booths to start writing, the clock began ticking. We had exactly three hours to write a short story by hand in a spiral notebook while drinking coffee.

Was I nuts, or what?

I ordered a cup of coffee and a Reuben lunch special, which included a Reuben sandwich, fries, and cole slaw. I hadn’t had a Reuben in around five years and I hadn’t been in a diner in around five years. I love Reuben sandwiches. What the heck else was I supposed to do?

While I waited for my lunch to arrive I stared at the blank ruled page of the spiral notebook I opened. I was used to seeing the blank white page on my laptop. I was utterly confused.

Halfway through my cup of coffee (I was already experiencing the jitters) the food arrived. I began eating as I continued to stare at the blank lined page of the spiral notebook. I was at a total loss as to what to write.

Then, suddenly, a man sat down at my booth across from me. I looked up and it was Kramer from the Seinfeld TV show. It wasn’t the actor Michael Richards but rather the actor Michael Richards playing Kramer. He was barely seated when he started blabbering on and on about everything and nothing. He eventually ordered a French Dip.

I looked around the diner and realized that Chad was now sitting with Eva Longoria from Desperate Housewives. And Eloisa was sitting with Jim Carey in his role from Dumber and Dumber.

WTF?

After Kramer’s French Dip arrived he began to eat but his talking didn’t slow down one bit. He kept blabbering and blabbering.

I tried to tune him out and write. I began to think about a short story that involved sitting in a diner with some celebrity who wouldn’t shut up but the continuity of the story was difficult to establish. It went all over the place. My writing made no sense.

I had a few pages written but it made no sense. Then I looked out over the diner and I saw Chad getting up from his booth. Holding hands with Eva Longoria, he walked out of the diner and on his way out he tossed his spiral notebook in the trash. I was elated. Now the competition was just between me and Eloisa.

Looking at the booth where Eloisa was sitting with Jim Carey I saw that they were in a very heated argument. Which meant that she was not writing.

I suddenly felt like I had a chance of winning this writing contest. So I focused more on my writing in the spiral notebook. I tried to block Kramer out but so many of his standard colloquialisms found their way into my writing. It was so hard to focus on the writing with him blabbering away at the table. Even after he ordered pie for both of us (he ordered pecan while I ordered peach) he just never shut the heck up.

Has anyone out there ever tried to write while Kramer was talking your ear off?

And then some stranger walked into the middle of the cafe and blew a whistle. Everyone in the diner put their hands to their ears. The contest was over.

Eloisa and I turned in our spiral notebooks. I was profoundly embarrassed. The four pages in the spiral notebook that I had written in did not even remotely resemble a short story. It was just incoherent blabbering that was interspersed with random quotes from Seinfeld.

But Eloisa’s writings were merely a page and a half of derisive comments about sexual inequality with no hint of a story.

To my confounded amazement, I won the writing contest!

I won! I won! I won!

It was the only writing contest I ever won — and only the second writing contest I ever entered!

I was jumping up and down.

I was a winner! I was a winner! I was a winner!

On stage I was given a plaque showing that I was the winner. And then I was given the grand prize which was ten US dollars.

And then I was given my bill from the diner which was $14.79 US dollars.

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