On Sunday, I received some unexpected but wonderful news. It was announced that I had won the Green Shoots Writing Competition, run by the Essex Book Festival. And I’ve spent the past couple of days trying to put into words how happy this has made me.

For context:
The competition was open to writers between the ages of 18 and 28, who were asked to submit an eco-themed short story of no more than 2,000 words. All pieces had to be prose and were to be submitted with no identifying information within the document. Each story was then assessed on its own merits, their authors completely anonymous.