Chapter 121: Assorted Hardware

Sunday, April 29, 1984

We were all up bright and early. Breakfast was the same as yesterday, which I appreciated.

Postings came out at ten, and we all went and read them. Cammie and Paige would get their turn soon enough.

For our fifth round, we had a team from New Trier, Illinois. Their names didn’t seem familiar, so I guessed they hadn’t stayed in Chicagoland for the summer (well, that, or they hadn’t gone to a summer program at all).

The other Debaters all felt like their match-ups probably indicated they’d done well. Of course, for individual events, who knew? Only CX really gave anyone a major hint.

Our opponents, Michaelis/McDermott, turned out to be Laura Michaelis (who — amusingly to me at least — was a strawberry blonde, which was close enough to redheaded to count) and Moira McDermott (whose hair was dirty blonde). Both of them grinned when Cammie came in. We headed right over and shook hands.

“First girl we’ve debated here!” Laura said. “Kinda sucks to do that in the power-match round!”

Cammie nodded. “I know! We brought a two-girl team and a guy-girl team, besides us.”

“Way ahead of the curve!” Moira said. “Our other team is two guys.”

She lowered her voice to a stage whisper and said, “It’s okay with us if you beat them.”

Laura snickered at that.

Cammie said, “Sorry, can’t return the favor. We have to stick up for our own.”

“Even the other guy-girl team?” Laura said, chuckling.

“My sister’s the girl on that team,” I said.

“Oh! Objection withdrawn!” Moira said.

As we sat down, Cammie whispered, “Remember, I’m supposed to keep you away from redheads named Laura from Illinois!”

“This one’s fine. Problem all solved now,” I whispered back.

“Sure it is!” she whispered, but she was smiling.

It was truly a shame that this was a preliminary round. This could have been — should have been, perhaps — finals, or damn close. They were impressive, and we were sometimes hard-pressed to stay on our game. They attacked, we defended, and back and forth things went — just as a great round should go.

By the end, I’d probably have said we edged them out, but it was tight, and I imagined if we did this round ten times we’d finish about even with them.

The judge left after we’d finished and were packing up. Laura sighed after the door closed.

“That was intense!” she said. “You guys are good!”

“So are you!” Cammie said. “Toughest round here and probably ... top three this year for us? Four? Five?”

“What were the others?” Laura said.

“We had a prelims round just like this at one tournament,” I said. “And then finals at Northwestern’s summer program and finals at our state tournament.”

“Yours is done?” Moira said. “Laura! That means we just held our own with at least one Nationals-bound team!”

Laura chuckled. “I was pretty sure they were that good. We went to Redlands, and I just now realized your two-girl team must be Megan Early and Anne Evans.”

Moira blushed a bit. “Missed that!”

Cammie nodded. “Yeah, that’s them.”

“They’re good, too!” Moira said. “They’re here? We have got to look them up!”

“Sure do,” Laura said. “They’re classy, and they’re going to be a nightmare next year, I bet.”

“I don’t relish the idea of debating them now,” I said.

“Me neither,” Cammie said.

“Hopefully we’ll meet again and can rematch in finals,” Laura said.

“We’d like that,” I said, with Cammie nodding.

“Not if we can help it!” Moira said. “We want to like it more than you do!”

That got everyone chuckling.

As before, the gap between breakfast and lunch was short. Lunch was burgers, as it’d been last year, and just as before, we under-ate. We’d have dinner in six or seven hours, and we’d had a solid breakfast. No sense running out of energy mid-afternoon, but no sense getting slowed down by a big lunch.

Anne and Megan were pretty confident about their fifth round (and also somewhat apologetic for not telling us about Laura and Moira; they’d missed the names). Angie and Gene were a bit less confident, though they had to admit that, if their opponents were really good, it probably meant they were doing well, too.

Sixth-round pairings came out around one. Our opponents were Blair / Penderson from Lakeland, Florida. None of our friends knew anything about them. We checked twice this time, which made Anne and Megan blush — and threaten to hurt us.

Peter Blair and Ron Penderson turned out to be juniors. They were looking at going to Northwestern, and we gave them our recommendation. Both of them struck me as eager, enthusiastic, and really smart, in a way that would probably have made them fit in well at Memorial.

They were good; we were better. That reinforced that, unlike last year, they probably hadn’t flipped the power matching.

By the end of the round, I think Cammie and I were thinking the same thing: we were either 5-1 or 6-0, barring a total surprise, and therefore we’d almost certainly broken.

If so, that gave us just one tournament left at which not to break.

The last teams trickled in around three. Not too long after, Kentucky’s Debate coach came out and greeted us.

“Thank you for joining us this weekend! We know this is a big trip for many programs — not just in terms of wanting to get here, but also in terms of cost and planning. It wouldn’t be the tournament that it is if people didn’t join us, so — thank you! Whether you’re breaking or not, every one of you is a champion.”

There was some chuckling at that.

He said, “I know, I know — ‘All of you are champions, but some of you are more champions than others!’”

That got a solid round of laughter.

“It wouldn’t be a tournament if we didn’t have winners or losers, but you got here by reaching a level most people in your chosen events haven’t attained. That, in my book, makes you champions. Believe me — a decade from now, being here will be more important to you than what you did here, unless perhaps you’re one of the few who leave here with a trophy. If this is just about leaving with hardware, we’ve failed, and we’ve failed you as well.”

This time there was some laughter, some nodding, and a fair number of thoughtful faces.

“That said, everyone wants to leave here with hardware. It’s just that very few of you can, by the nature of things. For the rest of you — you’re still great, and you should know that, deep down. With that, I’ll step aside and we’ll post octofinals rounds!”

Everyone applauded. He headed off to wherever it was that he hung out, and a bunch of assistants appeared with postings sheets.

As usual, Cammie and Paige braved the throngs while the rest of us waited. More and more programs had started doing what we did — sending just one or two people — but, for the most part, it still felt like it was every person for themselves.

They were back within about five minutes.

Cammie went first this time, since she’d gone second at State.

“Okay! We’ll start with CX! Breaking, we have me and Steve as well as Megan and Anne.”

That meant Gene’s Memorial career was over. He was smiling, though.

“In Extemp, we have Amit, Sue, Steve, and Jaya.”

Cammie was out. I didn’t think it bothered her all that much.

“Finally, since they don’t have LD, I’m declaring Jaya the winner by default.”

That got a lot of laughter and applause. It also had Jaya both blushing and grinning.

Paige took over, saying, “Congrats, Jaya! Over on the Drama side, in Duo we have ... everyone! Again!”

Another round of laughter followed that.

“In Humorous, we have Angie, Jas, Jess, and Lexi.”

Paige was out in Humorous, then. That was a bit of a shock, really.

“And, finally, in Dramatic, we have me, Jas, and Jess. Which is everyone!”

One more round of laughter, a bunch of hugs, and some kisses later, we all (save Gene) got back to business. Jas, as usual, had the most business of all. Gene, meanwhile, quietly shifted to being the wind beneath Sue’s wings, a role he might hopefully stay in for life.

Our octofinals opponents were again new to us. Carole Bayer and Michael Finnegan hailed from Seattle and were ... well, I guess they were better than Angie and Gene. That, or luckier.

We had to work, but I felt fairly sure we’d won. My guess was that this meant we were near the top of the bracket. I had no idea where Anne and Megan were, and I doubted they did either. Their opponents were from Connecticut and were another team we knew nothing about.

I did my best with Extemp, but I definitely felt like I was on borrowed time there. Breaking was good, but I could be happily done at any point.

That said, until I was done, I’d keep doing my best. What was the point of doing less?

Dinner was pizza, which was just fine by me. The crowd had noticeably thinned out. Some schools would be done, and some of the people who were done wouldn’t be hanging out supporting their teammates.

Postings came out about an hour after we’d gotten back.

Paige started, saying, “In Duo, I hate to say it, but sorry, Sheila and Lexi.”

Sheila and Lexi hugged, and then everyone hugged them. Sheila was done; we’d see about Lexi.

“In Humorous, we have Angie, Jess, and Lexi.”

Jas was out, but she had at least one other event.

And, in Dramatic, we have me, Jas, and Jess. Still everyone!”

Jess was hanging in there. I wondered if there was anyone else here still going in two events in their first year of competition.

Cammie got up, and said, “No change in CX.”

Everyone applauded.

“In Extemp, sorry, Steve. You can concentrate on CX, though!”

Everyone laughed, including me. Five and a half years of high school Extemp was enough for anyone, in my opinion.

“And in LD, Jaya’s still the champ!”

Another round of laughter, and a grin from Jaya. This time, she put both arms over her head and bounced up and down.

We got together in a group hug, then broke up to figure out what we were doing.

Cammie and I hadn’t heard of our opponents — Kaufman / Martin from Bronx Sci — before. Angie and Gene had debated them, though, and Gene told us as much as he could. Mostly, it was that they were fast, good, and somewhat quiet and hard to hear until their Second Negative Rebuttal, at which point the volume increased to what Gene described as ‘strident,’ with the content described as ‘mocking.’

Cammie and I nodded to each other. We’d seen it before — not with these people, but in general. Present everything, but make it just a tiny bit muddied. Not so muddied that the round was bad, just a bit problematic. Then, in your last speech, claim the affirmative team had failed to respond to your oh-so-clear points which oh-so-clearly proved their case was junk, and that letting them do so in their last speech would be oh-so-unfair.

We’d be ready.

I think we’d have been ready for Ben Kaufman and David Martin under any circumstances, but Gene’s warning certainly helped. I presented our case at the most even pace that I could, not giving them any sign that we had another gear (much less two). Ben’s cross-ex was a bit hostile, which I’d expected, and I refused to get riled up.

David blasted through a veritable mountain of generic negative arguments. It wasn’t at all invalid, just ... odd. It read almost like an affirmative case — something they could trot out every round without modification. There’s a huge time management advantage to doing that. The disadvantage is that some of your arguments will inevitably look foolish — but they’ll only look foolish if the affirmative team can respond to them immediately.

Cammie knocked her response out of the park. She started slow, hit second gear about two minutes in, and third gear a bit over three. She covered everything David had put out there and had time for about a minute of new affirmative arguments.

I’ll give them all the credit in the world. Ben’s second negative was damn good in terms of specifics, and he shored up some of the generics about as well as anyone could have, with David taking his rebuttal and shoring up what Ben hadn’t gotten to.

Still, I had a third gear, too, and I swatted everything they’d both said away and managed to do it clearly and at a reasonable volume.

From that point on, they pretty much knew they were in trouble. Ben tried loud and strident, but they didn’t have a lot of grounds to claim we’d missed anything, and loud just sounds loud if you’re following a team who stayed at a reasonable volume.

We shook hands after the round, fairly certain that we’d won. I couldn’t read them, but I thought they seemed confident, too. Can’t fault them for that — anyone who’s in quarterfinals at ToC has won a lot of rounds, most likely, and thinks they deserve to win most of them.

Cammie and I might have actually had an edge with our series of near misses. We knew we could falter, and were focused on not doing so.

We had about half an hour’s wait for everyone to get back from their quarterfinals rounds. As they had last year, ToC was posting semifinals tonight, to allow teams that hadn’t made it that far to make other plans.

I think most people were grateful for that. It’s much easier to get to bed if you know what you’re doing in the morning.

When postings came out, Cammie and Paige were on it.

Cammie started out, saying, “Sorry, Anne and Megan.”

Anne said, “That’s okay. Beat ‘em for us!”

“We’ll do our best!” Cammie said, grinning. “Over in Extemp, sorry, Sue.”

And thus ended Sue’s high school debate career. I doubted she had any regrets. My first-life Sue hadn’t, and she hadn’t reached many of the highs this Sue had, after all.

Paige got up and said, “No change in anything. Everyone who was still going is still going.”

That was pretty awesome news to end the evening on. We all hugged, and then everyone went to look and see who was still in.

Cammie and I were debating Martin/Green from Lake Braddock. During the walk back, Anne and Megan said they were just a straight-up good team, one they’d compare to Cammie and me. No gimmicks, no tricks, just solid all around.

It should be a great round.

On the other side of the bracket, Laura and Moira were still in, which made me feel good. They were too good to have been out at this point, in my opinion. Of course, so were Megan and Anne, but you can’t have everything. They were debating a team from Pittsburgh that none of us had seen.

As much as I didn’t want to debate Laura and Moira again, it would be fun to meet them in finals. Could still happen!

We were in bed within half an hour of getting back to the hotel. Tomorrow was, after all, a very big day!

Monday, April 30, 1984

We did pretty much the same things this year as last year, which I suppose just meant we were veterans now. Up by seven-thirty, and at the Student Center for breakfast by eight-thirty, with our bags packed and stored at the motel’s storage room.

As it was last year, the Student Center was full of university students, with far fewer of us high school kids hanging around. Many teams had left early, for sightseeing or to get home.

We ate, tried to talk about nearly anything other than our upcoming rounds, and waited.

Shaun Martin and Mike Green turned out to be pleasant, or at least that’s how we found them. They shook hands, told us that Kevin and Paul had been very complimentary of us, and that they were looking forward to this round. We, in turn, told them that Megan and Anne were complimentary of them, and that we were looking forward to it, too.

Virginia hadn’t had their state tournament yet, but we wished them luck in getting to Nationals. I had to figure they had a damn good shot at it, considering where we were meeting, but... ‘any given round,’ right?

This easily could’ve been finals. Finals of any tournament, finals of ToC, finals of Nationals — didn’t matter. They were very, very good. So were we. I really liked their affirmative case — a pretty elegant spin on the Exclusionary Rule, mandating court procedures which directly penalized illegally obtained evidence without excluding it by forcing police departments and others to post significant bonds. They’d deftly avoided most of the standard arguments by doing it that way.

On the other hand, we had plenty to run with. Loss of police credibility, judicial deference to the police, the idea that financial sanctions might motivate lying and cover-ups, and so forth. That, and all of the usual negative arguments (including, of course, the notion that even a tiny change in court procedures would inevitably lead to global thermonuclear war).

Whoever won, they’d have their hands full with whoever won the other semifinals round, I was sure — but that’s the way it’s supposed to be.

Cammie and I waited, second-guessing each other. Anne and Megan, along with Gene and Sue, had watched the round. All of them except for Gene thought we’d edged them out, and Gene hoped he was wrong. He also had the most interesting take of all, saying that Curtis would hate their case and it’d better not get to the Fifth Circuit.