Today I learned how to distinguish between a counterfeit and authentic record album.  Inside the tracks, but outside the label, on the smooth ring, there are etchings if the LP is "real," or so the antique dealer showed me.   And the title of the album on the record label is above the turntable peg hole, not below as is often the case with a counterfeit record.  This is important for certain collectors mainly because it authenticates the album cover, which is apparently what collectors are going for, not the black vinyl disc encapsulating memory after musical memory in it's black shiny surface. Who knew?  With my recently purchased portable turntable, I am still after the music.  And I don't really care if the album is authentic or counterfeit, as long as it plays my tunes.

Coming out of my writing bubble, after weeks of working on a new romance short story, my mind has been more on authentic writing.  Or as one author giving a presentation on characterization said recently, "writing that makes your reader care."  

"How do you know when you've done that?" an audience member asked. 

This award-winning, multi-published author was quick with her answer.  "If it makes you cry and you laugh when you read it."   

If you're a multi-published, award-winning author!  Sure.  Maybe this is generally true for the rest of us? We can only hope.  Cry, maybe.  Laugh, I'm not so sure.   

But what I've been collecting today is ways to know you are done with a story that don't require any guessing about what a reader's reaction will be.  (Besides, unless you are a writing wizard, you've already had people read the story and react if you think you are done.)    

When a story you have enjoyed all along begins to seem really uninteresting, and you think you are done, you are done. 
When you keep skimming paragraph after familiar paragraph no matter how hard you try to read them for a final edit, you are done.
And when you do focus in to read your sentences one more time and rewrite them, only to change them back on the next read through to the exact wording you had before, YOU ARE REALLY DONE.  Send it off.  

I am, and I did.