Competition angst

This is what I always do - send off something to a competition and then the agony starts.

First I'm realistic - lots of people sent work in for this competition, and many of them are already experienced and published and brilliant. I'm just a student, even if I am superannuated, I don't have to be brilliant, but it's a good thing to do, makes you work harder.

Then I go through the buts, but I am doing really well on my course, but I was published before, but I was shortlisted for a small competition in Writer's news last year...

Then the weeks roll round until the time when the 'winners will be notified'. Now the endless checking my emails begins, I wonder if my entries are any good, are being laughed over, even didn't get there at all. They say the middle of March, is that the 14th or 15th or 16th or do they mean not the beginning or end, but the three weeks in the middle? Or are they snowed under by all the brilliant stuff they received, and won't even know until April?

Of course, the real question is, is my story and good or not, and does it matter if one person on one day though it good enough to puit it on the 'possible' pile? One thing this writing lark is about, it's dealing with rejection. I need to have a world weary contempt for the whole process, but somehow while my body has aged my enthusiasm for writing is scarily positive and youthful. I'm just going to have to look at the work I sent in, and enjoy it for what it is - good enough for me.