I was a half-century old, and I’d never won a thing.

Not a book award, not a lousy toaster or a trip to Cancun or nice stationery or a dinner for two at the downtown Keg Manor. I’d fantasized about prestigious ceremonies, big cash prizes. I read John Steinbeck’s 1962 Nobel speech and thought, “What would I say?” Or maybe I thought “What will I say,” because I had quite the imagination, and I was delusional.

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