In the eighth grade at school, I entered my first poetry competition. A poem about Jackie Kennedy visiting her husband’s grave by moonlight in rhyming couplets won me second prize, a copy of Shakespeare’s Much Ado About Nothing. I’ve since been a finalist, runner-up, second runner-up, and honourably mentioned, more times than I care to remember, but as the saying goes, “always the bridesmaid, never the bride.” As far as I know, though, I have never come in last, and even if I had come last, I wouldn’t have had to read about it in the local paper.

There are many good reasons for not wanting to be a grand prize winner. In an early Roman poetry contest Lucan was unlucky enough to win first prize over the Emperor Nero. Nero fed him to the lions. In declining the Nobel Prize for Literature in 1964, Jean-Paul Sartre wrote, “If I sign my name ‘Jean-Paul Sartre,’ it is not the same as if I sign ‘Jean-Paul Sartre, Nobel Prize winner.’ A writer must refuse to allow himself to be transformed into an institution, even if it takes place in the most honourable form.”

Early last May, I decided I would run for the Village of Masset Council. Instead of complaining about all the problems within this honourable institution, I would volunteer myself to become part of the problem.

I should have known better. For starters, I am not any kind of team player; I am more suited to the dictatorship role. When people write to me expressing a desire to obtain gainful employment at my guest house, and say they look forward to being part of “our team,” their application goes straight into the recycling bin.

When I nominated myself for the position of Village Councillor, I was told that if I changed my mind I could always withdraw. Rather like when my daughter announced she was getting married, and I said, “How wonderful! And if it doesn’t work out, you can always get a divorce.”

What no one told me was that I should withdraw before it was too late. When, on October 7, I informed the Village office of my change of heart, I received a message from the Acting Assistant Deputy Minister of Housing and Municipal Affairs saying he was not able to support my request to withdraw as advance voting had already taken place. The helpful folks at the Village office suggested I let everyone know of my decision to withdraw on social media.

I posted my resignation on Facebook and got 115 likes. I don’t know if this was because people liked that I posted my resignation or that they liked the fact I withdrew. My daughter told me I tend to overthink too much. (Is “overthink too much” a redundancy?)

Even having withdrawn from the race, I received 49 votes. I did see one ad where WITHDRAWN had been written beside my name; a local comedian texted me, “You have 49 friends who can’t read.” The truth is, some people voted early (and were annoyed with me because they discovered they had wasted a vote) and others weren’t on social media at all, which was heartening. Another possibility is that my 49 supporters could read but just thought WITHDRAWN was a behavioural trait. (I know my friend Sally would have voted for me if she hadn’t inconveniently chosen to live outside the Village limits, and she is one avid reader.)

I love being a writer. What I can’t stand is the paperwork. And, after studying the Village of Masset’s website to learn what my legal duties would be, should I be elected — the job involved drafting, debating, evaluating zoning variances, answering the telephone, attending meetings, and serving as a committee member on several different boards — I felt desperate. How would I steal the time? The website also used a lot of abstract words like sustainability, accountability, management, economic development — language stripped of sensory detail, hot verbs and any kind of risk — linguistic foam from which my easily overstimulated brain recoils. Furthermore, a veteran councillor from another community advised me, if I valued my sanity, I should bolt for the nearest exit.

Of course, I should have thought of all these potential pitfalls before I self-nominated. While we are inclined to judge others by their actions, I’ve read, we judge ourselves by our intentions. My intentions were honourable. My actions were — like the BC government’s decision to remain on daylight saving time instead of standard time — ill-advised and impractical.

Just for the record, I didn’t come last. I withdrew. One good thing did come from this experience, however. I finally found the words I wish to be carved onto my headstone when the time arrives.

SHE WITHDREW.