I didn't win?!?!

I recently entered a short story contest. This was a first for me. My writing career started with a steamy romance written in High School, which to my embarassement my mother found. I find I am still embarassed by this, how does Jude DeVeroux do it? I was so traumatized by that experience that I stuck to letter writing for the next 10 years. Several recipients of my letters saved them and these letters have found their way back to me over the years. It's funny to read them and I will post some of them on this blog in the future.
Back to the short story contest. After moving to South Carolina 4 years ago, I started a book about my experiences with moving and the culture shock that greeted us in a small southern town. It was the first time in a long time that I let my family read something I had written other than letters of course. Well, they liked it. They gave me suggestions for making it longer, for what tense to use and other general comments. I got excited, maybe I could be a writer. I daydreamed about the talk shows I would go on after my first best seller. I thought about the bio that would be inside the cover of my books. I vowed to loose weight so that my publicity photo would show a youthful almost 50 year old. I thought about who I would thank and most importantly how the dedication would read. I eventually came back to reality and realized that I had no idea how or what I needed to really write a book that people outside of those who know and love me would want to read. So I entered the short story contest, just to see what would happen. I edited one of the chapters from my "book." It was called Boobs and Dixie Cups. Of course, I will blog this later too. I am sad to report I didn't win, I didn't even get a thanks for entering letter. So for now I will confine my efforts to this blog and see what you all think.