Imagine if Wednesday Addams from The Addams Family television show participated in a pageant.

Now imagine if she took third place.

Lane Lindblom is a real life Wednesday Addams who did just that.

The 14-year-old Tahoma Junior High student and Japanese culture aficionado — she described “Avatar: Last Air Bender” as a “starter kit” for Anime — first got involved when a letter randomly arrived in the mail advertising about the Miss Jr. Teen Seattle pageant competition.

“I thought, ‘Well, why not?” Lane Lindblom said.

Her mother, Marie Lindblom, said they never quite figured out why she got sent the letter.

“To this day we suspect it was a teacher,” she said.

Lane Lindblom said what attracted her to it was the idea of doing something new. Even though she says she is comfortable talking to friends in an informal setting, she becomes nervous when presenting a speech in class. The pageant, to her, was an opportunity to confront that fear.

“I wanted to know that I could actually do stuff in front of a crowd,” she said. “If I could get in that would be rather miraculous.”

After checking out the website to make sure it was legitimate and not merely spam, Lane Linblom and her parents signed up for the competition, all the while thinking that they wouldn’t be involved for very long due to their lack of knowledge and experience.

“We are not (what you would call) a pageant family,” Marie Lindblom said.  “We never coached her, trained or practiced. We thought the experience was to be the experience of the pageant. Every week we expected someone to tell us ‘Don’t come back.’”

Lane Lindblom said her impression of a pageant concerned lots of hairspray and multiple stages of elimination.

During the first interview, she was asked why she wanted to be there. She replied that as a child she had once desired to participate in a pageant, but never got the chance.

“I said it was time to live up to my childhood dream,” she said.

After passing the first round of questions, she then came back the next week. Although the pageant proved to involve less hairspray than she had originally thought, she still struggled with various aspects of the competition, including the walk routine as part of their stage performance.

“I was really nervous,” Lane Lindblom said. “I don’t think I’d been in front of a crowd that big. I was thinking, ‘If I don’t do this right I’m going to look like a fool.”

Additionally, Marie Lindblom said finding suitable attire for Lane proved to be an adventure unto itself.

“They said she needed evening wear,” the elder Lindblom said. “Evening wear? She’s 14!”

Uncertain of where to go, their personal odyssey took them through Seattle’s various department stores in search for a dress that would both fit and seem appropriate for the teen. Finally, they found a dress at Betsy Johnson’s which they felt fit with Lane’s personality.

For the informal wear, she wore an anime outfit along with her father’s tie and a black shirt. Marie Lindblom said she had to fight with Lane to get her to wear any mascara

“She looked like a Catholic school girl,” Marie Lindblom said. “It’s a little bit punky, but it’s her.”

During her interview with the judges, she was told beforehand that she did not have to give “politically correct” answers, which made her feel unprepared when she was asked by one of the judges what she would do to change the world. She responded by discussing the tradition in certain African tribes of forcing girls to marry once they turn 12, well before they are physically or emotionally prepared to become mothers. Lane Lindblom said she learned about this tradition in the seventh grade.

When it came time to announcing the top finishers, Lane Lindblom said when she heard her name called for third place she was in a state of disbelief. Eventually they had to call her name out again.

“At first, there was nothing going on in my head,” she said. “I asked others girls ‘Did they call my name.’ It might have been an accident.”

Marie Lindblom said she had to scramble to get her camera out, as she had not expected her daughter to advance so far.

While Lane Lindblom said her third place win allows her to advance to other competitions, this is as far as she plans to go. Not only would they have to pay for travel expenses, but she said she has accomplished what she set out to do.

“After she took third she said, ‘Okay, we’re done now,’” Marie Lindblom said.