a first

So this morning I opened my e-mail, and lo and behold:

Dear Eliza,

Thank you for your submission to Expanded Horizons.  I have read your
story, “Night Out,” and have decided to include it in our upcoming June
issue.  Congratulations!

If this works out, “Night Out” – a short, sci-fi piece I wrote back in college and which I had revised and re-revised for years – yes, years, because it actually started out as a novelette, until I realized that half of the damn thing is clutter – will be my first publication in an international market.

Yay.