How to Win the School Photo Competition

So you want to win the school photography competition. Fine. Here's the plan.

One: read the rules. There's always one rule that matters, and this year it's this — one photo per person. One. Not “my best three”.

Two: produce a lot of pictures. Real photographers take two hundred to get one good one, and you're not a real photographer yet, so take three hundred. Take three hundred of the same tree if you like. Nobody checks.

Three: review them at eleven at night with a bag of chips. Most of them are terrible. This is normal.

Four: show the best five to your sister. She'll say, “That one's blurry.” She's right.

Five: print the sunset behind the sports hall, because that's the one you're entering. Then print the cat picture too, the stupid one — the school cat asleep on the trash cans, with your thumb across the corner — because it makes your sister laugh.

Six: present your photo. Name on the back, into the box outside the art room. Promise yourself you don't care who wins. This promise is a lie, and everybody's promise is a lie.

Seven: wait nine days.

On Friday, the school paper publishes the winner. It's the cat.

You put the wrong print in the box.

Next year, do that again.