He is collecting juvenilia from contemporary writers. In fact, he wants the first thing they have ever written, if they have a copy of it. He asks me to contribute. I think back to my terrible first story which I entered in a contest held every year (back in the early 1930s, that is) for New York City public high school seniors. Why did I write it? I remember that I needed some concrete evidence of my suitability to enter college, having been turned down by all the New York City colleges because I had failed the Civics Regents examination, the English 4 Regents, and one other whose subject I forget. So I thought if I could win the contest, I could go back to the rejecters, tell them about the award, and ask for some reconsideration. Maybe. I should make a full public confession. I failed so many Regents exams because Civics, English, and the other class I can’t remember all met in the afternoon. Too often I was no longer in school by then, having signed myself out of the station at noon, at a door for which I was a warden.
