Chapter 47: A Good Trip

Saturday, November 6, 1982

The alarm got me going at eight, and we were all on our way to the campus by nine. They had breakfast — much more basic than yesterday, but at least they didn’t expect us to fend for ourselves, and there were still grits — and we started competing at ten.

Four rounds in, I hadn’t felt like any of our CX rounds were difficult. As for Extemp and Humorous ... who knows? I felt good about my rounds, but the others could’ve been terrific and I’d look bad by comparison. You never know; all you can do is feel good about what you’ve done.

They fed us fried chicken with the usual sides at lunch. Pretty good, too. Feeding a bunch of people in suits and dresses fried chicken is tempting fate, but most people made it with minimal difficulty. Yes, they served Coke — we were in Atlanta. Diet Coke, too, thank goodness!

Well over two-thirds of the people in this room were done competing — they just didn’t know it yet. I was well aware that we were spoiled and had unreasonable expectations. I liked those expectations, but knew they weren’t realistic, not here.

Linda vanished a bit during lunch, returning after maybe fifteen minutes, looking just a bit down. When she sat down, she looked around, then said, “I called home, checking in. The team lost — first one of the season. Spring Branch showed up fired up, and we threw a couple of interceptions. Wound up 28-21. The ground game was going in the second half, or it’d have been worse.”

“That stinks,” I said. I wondered whether this had any connection to Jessica and her issues with Brett. I guessed it did. Spring Branch was an annoying loss, but — by itself — it wouldn’t tank the season. Our next game shouldn’t be that difficult, even if it was a playoff game. If she’d thrown Brett off, this would’ve been the game to choose.

As usual, the noise level in the cafeteria jumped up as postings went up. Also as usual, Cammie went to find out our fate. This time, Jasmine went with her to cover the Drama side.

Since we had fewer people in Drama, and because she loves drama, Jasmine went first.

“Okay, so ... breaking in Humorous: Angie, Lexi, and me. In Dramatic: Sheila and Caitlyn. In Duo, Carole and me.”

I hadn’t figured I would break in Humorous here. I was happy for Angie, though — she’d put in more work than I had, and was reaping the rewards.

Cammie took over. “Congrats, y’all. In Extemp, we have: Amit, Steve, Bree, Sue, and me. In LD, we have both Callie and Kenzie. And, in CX, Steve and me and Lizzie and Janet.”

A lot of disappointed faces, but no one was down. This was a tough tournament, and we had one-quarter of the CX teams, one-quarter of the LDers, and over an eighth of the Extempers. Anything more would’ve been a bit ridiculous. And, especially for our younger people, this was a lot of good experience.

Compare this to that one break at U Penn, and our reaction. There was just no comparison. Everyone pretty much hugged everyone, whether they’d broken or were on the sidelines, and not a soul among us was upset that they couldn’t get out early and go sightseeing.

Meg broke in after we’d settled. “Great job, everyone! And I mean that, whether or not you broke. Thanks for taking this trip and taking a chance. It’ll pay off for you, in Speech and Debate, and in life.”

Steffie grinned. “It will, and I’m proud of all of you. Now ... go kick some butt!”

“I guess we can say that,” Meg said, grinning, too.

“C’mon. I’m sure the football coach says much worse,” Steffie said.

“You’ve got a point there!”

This time, Cammie and I went to study the breaks, something we should do more often. At home, it might not matter. Here? We knew some of these teams. For instance, there was Dave and Angela, against Bryant/Wright of Glenbrook North — not far from where Angie had lived. We were taking on ... Wesley. That was interesting news, and something Cammie spotted as quickly as I had. Lizzie and Janet were going against a team from Woodward Academy — relatively local — and the fourth round was some people from Florida against some people from North Carolina.

Getting to know our opponents made sense. We might be up against Dave and Angela in a round. If we got past Wesley, anyway.

Cammie and I wheeled our luggage cart into one of the classrooms to find Wesley, along with some guy we’d never met, waiting for us. Wesley waved, and the guy turned, waving, too.

“Hi! I’m Kurt. Wesley told me a bunch about you.”

“Not true!” Cammie said, grinning.

“Hey! It was all nice!” Wesley said, grinning back.

“Yeah. He said it was your other CX team that were the killer sharks.”

“They can be out for blood,” I said.

“They’re really nice. Just ... really good,” Cammie said.

“I’ve only seen them across the room. Well ... mostly one. The pink one,” Wesley said. “We dodged everyone from your school in prelims.”

We bantered a bit longer, and then the judge came in and we settled down.

An hour and fifteen minutes later ... we’d won. I was sure of it, and I know Cammie was sure of it. And I was pretty certain Wesley and Kurt were sure of it. Hopefully, the judge was, too, or I’d be annoyed. We just plain had better command of our evidence against their case than they had of the evidence in favor.

The judge left as we were packing up. Wesley said, “See? I told you they were damn good.”

Kurt nodded. “Still, that was one of the best rounds I’ve ever been in. You’re at least on the next level, but it wasn’t just ... you know ... burying us in a bunch of ... stuff.”

Cammie made a face. “I hate that. I get why it’s a strategy, and ... we’ve done it a time or two, in desperation, but I still hate it. It should be at least connected to reality, right?”

“That’s what I think,” Wesley said. “Great round, and ... well ... even if we lost, which I think we did, I can’t think of a better team to lose to.”

“Nice meeting you,” Kurt said.

“You, too,” I said. “And, maybe — hopefully — we’ll see each other again.”

Kurt chuckled. “That’d take Nationals or ToC. Nationals ... maybe? Georgia seems a bit weak this year, and we’ll learn. We’re already qualified. I know you are.”

“We have to get past the sharks, though,” I said.

“Nah,” Cammie said. “We just have to get into finals with the sharks.”

“Now that I’d pay to watch,” Wesley said with a chuckle.

Extemp done (and with no feel for the results), we waited out the postings, Jasmine in my lap, Cammie at my side. Angie was in Gene’s lap. Amit was in Sheila’s lap, which was cute. Sue startled everyone by sitting in Lexi’s lap. I don’t think they were — or ever had been — an item, but ... it was also cute. They were certainly playing it as just silly fun, which is what I think it was. That, or ... hrm. Best not to think about what the girls might get up to at night at the motel, especially tonight with no worry about competition hanging over them.

Janet and Lizzie were about as confident as we were, and both Callie and Kenzie seemed optimistic. The rest? All harder to judge, since you don’t see the other competitors.

Following tradition, Cammie and Jasmine swapped.

“In Extemp, we still have: Amit, Steve, Sue, and me. Sorry, Bree.” Bree didn’t look all that broken up. “In LD ... sorry, Callie. Kenzie, you’re still in.” Callie looked a bit more disappointed. “And, in CX ... yeah, we’re both still in. Half the remaining teams.”

That got a bit of whooping.

Jasmine grinned. “Humorous: Angie and me. Sorry, Lexi, though you look like you got a nice consolation prize already.”

Both Sue and Lexi blushed at that.

“Dramatic: Sheila and Caitlyn, and Duo, Carole and me.”

More hugs, more go-get-ems. I felt like it was both unlikely that we’d hit finals with Janet and Lizzie and, at the same time, like Emory wasn’t necessarily harder than State, so ... maybe?

Checking the list ... no Dave and Angela. I looked around for them but didn’t see them. Hrm. Did that mean these guys were worse? I figured we should just try to stay confident and play our own game.

Our opponents introduced themselves as Peter Bryant and Jeff Wright. I was pretty sure I’d never seen either of them.

They were good. Really good. But ... they weren’t Dave and Angela good. I tried to square that with them beating Dave and Angela. Either they’d had a bad round, or Peter and Jeff had good luck, or ... maybe we’d improved more than I thought. That had to be possible, right?

In any case, we held our own, and maybe — I hoped — got a victory on points. We’d gone affirmative and their evidence wasn’t stellar against our case, but they’d run some of the big generic negative arguments more effectively than many teams could manage.

We shook hands, wished each other best of luck, then headed back to wait.

Those of us that remained (most of the schools had left by this time) were served po-boy sandwiches. Not as good as Antones, in my opinion — and they could’ve gone with the Atlanta theme and served Chick-fil-A, for that matter — but they were good, and we were all hungry. As I’ve said before, for an activity that’s not physical, somehow Debate gets you tired and hungry.

Cammie and Jasmine grabbed the results as soon as they could.

“Finals time! And yes, we have people there. Extemp: Amit and Sue. LD: go Kenzie! And, in CX ... us. Sorry, Janet and Lizzie.”

Lizzie looked annoyed. “Beat them for us. You and Steve. Seriously. We thought we’d get to meet you in finals.”