CHATSWORTH : Student Wins PTA Scholarship for Story

A five-page story about an old woman who is deluded into thinking a pizza delivery order is actually an order for a new house has earned Chatsworth High School senior Renee Fox, 17, a scholarship from the National Parent Teacher Assn.

“Actually, it’s incredible,” said Renee, adding that the $750 scholarship has helped confirm her chosen profession. “I want to be a writer.”

Renee was one of four winners across the nation who won scholarships from the National PTA in literature, music and visual and photographic arts education. The winners were notified two months ago, but their names were released only recently as part of next month’s national PTA convention next month in Orlando, Fla.

PTA officials said Renee’s story, “A Desert Delivery,” showed “high levels of conceptual and technical skill,” and won after being weighed against hundreds of entries.

Renee said she started writing short stories only a year ago, after switching from her first love, poetry. “People don’t appreciate it anymore,” she said of poetry, adding that it is also too difficult to survive as a poet.

In the winning story, the woman, who lives in the desert, dreams about the house she is expecting, talking to her “children,” who in reality are animals. After the pizza delivery finally comes, the story ends with the woman trying to find the pull cord that will turn the pizza box into a house.

“I have my own style,” said Renee, who plans to study English at Stanford University in the fall.

Even though she learned of the award two months ago, she is still excited by it, she said.

“The luster of winning never fades,” she said.