Chapter 35: Youth Are Our Future

Wednesday, September 7, 1983

Fortunately, my tests mostly went from hardest to easiest. English might not have been the hardest, but it was the least predictable. Tom Myerson trotted out a bunch of Government basics (he pretty much had to, given the time constraints). I had no problem remembering introductory calculus, and Computer Math was barely worth mentioning.

That left Drama and Debate, which hardly needed any thought at all.

At lunchtime, and throughout the rest of the day, rumors ran through the school like wildfire. Several people (the names and count varied by who was reporting it) had been suspended for this weekend’s football game for ‘violations of team rules.’

At one point, Cal and Andy had been included in the rumor, but by mid-afternoon, I’d gotten to talk to Andy, and he verified that they were in the clear. Andy was a bit pessimistic about Friday’s game. Some of those suspended were pretty important to the team, and he wasn’t sure if their backups were up to the task.

All things considered, if the coach wanted to send a message, doing it by risking an early loss in a non-District game made a lot more sense than doing so later in the season.

We’d said goodbye to everyone, either at lunch, in Drama, or in Debate, so we just headed straight home after school. Mom and Dad were ready, of course, and we got going just ahead of the worst of the rush hour traffic.

Even so, it was after eleven when we arrived in Washington, D.C., and Mom and Dad were both yawning.

“I don’t know how you keep these hours, kids,” Mom said, stifling another yawn.

“They’re teenagers. They’re supposed to,” Dad said.

“I can’t remember doing that,” Mom said. “I guess I did, though.”

Dad chuckled. “I did, but I had brothers to keep me up.”

“So did I!” Mom said.

When we got to baggage claim, there were several people holding up ‘Youth Are Our Future’ signs. This was the first time in either life that I’d arrived at an airport to find someone holding up a sign for me.

Dad nodded. “Go say hi. We’ll get the bags.”

I walked over to one of them, a woman likely in her mid-twenties. “Hi,” I said, “I’m Steve Marshall, and I’m probably one of the people you’re looking for.”

She lowered her sign and flipped through a list. As she did, I spotted a name tag saying ‘Kelly Diller.’

“Ah! I see you. Your parents and sister are here?”

I nodded toward the luggage carousel. “They’re grabbing the bags. Dad sent me over here.”

“Come find me once you’ve got your bags and I’ll get you on your way.”

“Thanks, Ms. Diller.”

She smiled a bit bigger. “Kelly is fine, thanks!”

“Thanks, Kelly!”

I headed back to find that they’d grabbed all the bags but one. I spotted it, grabbed it, and the four of us headed back to meet Kelly and get on our way.

They’d booked us in the Hilton. According to Angie, Reagan had been shot just outside this very hotel in her first go-round. That was about the only thing I knew about it, and it didn’t mean a lot since it hadn’t happened this go-round.

Mom and Dad had a room on one floor, while ours was on another. Technically speaking, Dad and I had one of those rooms, and Mom and Angie had the other, but (of course) that wasn’t how we were staying. The others in the program would just have to deal with an extra teenager on their floor. I doubted we were the only ones to bring the family, anyway.

They’d set up a suite where we could hang out, but it wouldn’t open until tomorrow. We were too tired, anyway. Mom and Dad hugged us goodnight and headed to their room. I’d see Dad at breakfast, but after that? The tentative schedule had been very hazy on details. Mom and Angie could join Dad in the ‘parents’ tour, but there didn’t seem to be many activities where I’d be with them.

Some kids might have a problem with this. First-life me wouldn’t have, but I was always very independent. Some people really aren’t.

Angie and I smooched and rubbed noses once in our room, then got right to undressing and getting ready for bed. As with Jas and me, by now we could easily play ‘old married couple.’

Ten minutes later we were snuggled up in bed, lights out.

Angie said, “Jasmine should be here.”

“Yeah,” I said, “but it would’ve been awkward all around, I think. I’m sure other people are bringing family. I doubt anyone’s bringing a girlfriend or boyfriend.”

“That’ll change soon, at least.”

“Can’t wait. Well, I can, but waiting is getting harder.”

“Yeah,” she said. “We’d better sleep.”

“I’m pretty sure I will. I’m exhausted.”

“Me, too. Knock ‘em dead tomorrow!”

I chuckled. “If I can, I will.”

“Love you, big bro.”

“Love you, little sis.”

“Always.”

“Forever.”

Thursday, September 8, 1983

They’d arranged breakfast in one of the Hilton’s ballrooms at nine. Dad and I met just outside (Angie and Mom would eat in the hotel restaurant), checked in at one of the registration tables, and were issued name tags. Dad’s was paper, while mine was a nice plastic one with a magnetic back. I guessed we’d be wearing them a lot.

It had my name and home town. I’d have put ‘Houston,’ but someone had done their research and put ‘Hunters Creek Village’ on it. Now I’d be explaining that we were pretty much a suburb of Houston all day. It was a conversation starter, anyway.

At least half of the attendees looked bleary. This was pretty brutal for the west-coasters, I’m sure. If they’d gone to school yesterday, they’d faced a longer flight with two more hours of jet lag.

They gave us about an hour to eat from the buffet before starting into anything, at least. That let the coffee drinkers (which I was, this morning) wake up a bit more, though I think some people ate themselves into a bit of a food coma.

Dad and I chatted with the other people at our table. We had two girls and a boy. Two had fathers with them, while the third had her mother (who made a point of being a single parent). The girls were from Montana and Nevada, while the boy was from South Carolina. They had resumes not that different from mine: National Merit Scholars, student council, extracurriculars (softball, band, and football), and so forth. None of them recognized my name, which was just as well.

Finally, a Mr. Finley, who was an Assistant Undersecretary of Something-or-Other (I believe it was ‘Community Affairs’) came out and gave a speech welcoming us. He wasn’t a great speaker, and it sounded much too much like some of the speeches we’d gotten before State. At least, my presumption was that they’d picked people who’d already evinced some level of ‘leadership,’ and the speech was mostly about how great it’d be if more youth learned to be leaders. It didn’t exactly pat us on the back for being leaders, and I doubted anyone in the room needed to be encouraged to be a leader, so ... not the best match of the material to the audience.

Oh well. We can’t all be good public speakers, now can we?

Once he’d finished, Mr. Finley promised our parents that we’d be well cared for, then sent them on their way. We’d meet up next for dinner, which would be in this same ballroom.

I hoped the Washington Hilton’s banquets were good. I’d eaten a lot more rubber chicken and well-done stringy beef at hotel banquets than the average high schooler had, and that was just in this go-round.

Mr. Finley and a couple of others moved us all to another ballroom, this one a bit smaller, and had everyone spread out a bit.

Mr. Finley said, “We’re going to do a little exercise. Instead of just having everyone introduce themselves, we’re going to break people up into groups, give them a problem to work through, and let the introductions happen as part of forming a group opinion about the problem.”

Sounded ... possible. Or like chaos. I was betting on the second, but that’s me: optimistic and cynical at the same time. Hey, it’s worked so far!

Mr. Finley and his two assistants (names not provided, and they didn’t have name tags) split us up by the simple count-off method. We wound up in nine groups, spaced out evenly in the room. We had eight in my group, so we probably had at least one kid from every state and a few more from the larger ones. At least, that’s how I would have done it. Wouldn’t do to leave a state out, after all!

Our group got the topic ‘Forging Better Relationships With the Soviet Union.’ Oddly, that was one where I knew we’d actually succeed despite ourselves, even if things were going to get even more awkward first (looking at you, 1984 Olympics!).

I spotted the problem almost at once. Out of our group of eight, three felt the best way to do that would be to pressure them until they collapsed (a tactic that had worked surprisingly well). Two felt that we just needed to keep doing what we were doing and wait for their Old Guard to die off (again, a tactic much more viable than any of them could have known, though Brezhnev had been a hint). The other two felt it was an insolvable problem. We were Capitalists, they were Marxists, and never the twain shall meet.

Meanwhile, I could hear a nearby group talking about what to do in terms of limiting nuclear weapons, and three of them felt we should just unilaterally disarm because using them would kill everyone. Those three seemed to be winning, too.

The mismatch was grating, and I finally got annoyed by it. Perhaps that was the goal here, but I wasn’t betting on it.

I said, “Hang on, y’all. I want to go talk to Mister Finley for a few minutes.”

One of them, a guy from New York, cringed at ‘y’all.’ I hadn’t particularly liked some of his phrasings, either, so...

I left and walked over to Mr. Finley. “Sir?” I said.

“Yes, um,” he said, then glanced at my name tag. “Steve?”

“I’ve noticed that the groups are a little ... well ... less optimal than they might be.”

“What do you mean?” he said.

“If you leave it to my group, we’d be somewhere between escalating the arms race or deciding the Cold War is a permanent, unchangeable constant. Meanwhile, I can hear a group nearby, and they’re ready to throw in the towel so we don’t kill the planet. The problem is that they’re over there, and we’re over where we are, and no one’s talking to each other. Now, maybe we’re going to reshuffle after we finish...”

The look on his face said that, no, that wasn’t going to happen.

“But if not, we’re missing an opportunity. We’ve got birds of a feather flocking together. We need to get opposites, hopefully attracting, but even disagreeing would be better.”

“I’m not sure what to do...”

“I have an idea, if you’ll listen to me.”

He would, and I laid out my plan. He decided either that it would work, or that he might as well let the crazy kid knock himself out. Either one would work for me.

“Everyone!” I said, speaking as loudly as I could — which is pretty loud.

Heads turned.

“You don’t know me and that’s fine. I’ve prevailed upon Mister Finley to try this a different way. If it’s awful, all of you have carte blanche to say mean things about me. Anyway, I’m temporarily in charge here...”

That was a nod to Angie, or perhaps Al Haig, if she was quoting Al correctly.

“And we’re resetting everything. Give your topic sheets back to anyone from the program.”

People did. Sometimes just shouting at people and acting like you’re in charge puts you in charge. A very fun, very weird set of books called that a ‘Bavarian Fire Drill.’

“Now — that axis,” I pointed to one wall, “is the liberal vs conservative side. If you feel like you’re more conservative — whatever that means to you — it’s the right side, of course. The left side is for those who are more liberal.”

A few people started to move.

“Wait!” I said. “There’s another axis. That wall,” and I pointed to the wall ninety degrees to one side, then the other, “is the authoritarian vs anarchist wall. You might be conservative but want everyone to be free to do what they want, and just hope it’s conservative things, or you might want to make sure there are laws and rules about everything. The same goes for liberals. If you can’t decide, the middle of the room is your place. To do this right, I’d ask a bunch of questions that weren’t so obvious and score you, but I don’t have the list of questions and we don’t have the time, so just ... self-identify! This is a quick and dirty sorting method. Now, go!”

People, surprisingly, went. A few hesitated, and a few just plain looked lost, but most people sorted themselves. I wasn’t surprised that we got a bunch in the middle of one wall or the other, or standing halfway between the middle and a corner, but it looked like reasonable sorting.

Once everyone was settled, I said, “Now, we’re going to hand out topics and take them up again.”

One of the staff started towards a group. I said, “Stop! People from the program, we need to split groups up again. The goal here is to get groups that are as mixed as possible, so pick eight people from as many different parts of the room as you can, please!”

That got some mumbling, but they went to it.

I wound up in a group with the topic ‘How can we best address inflation?’ This time the debate was much more lively, with some people arguing for price controls, others arguing for what was essentially ‘from each according to his ability, to each according to his needs.’ We had a lively debate, and while it was much better at producing differences than answers, everyone (even me, I think) learned something. Certainly, the people who thought we should just slow economic activity until things couldn’t inflate learned a lot about job losses and how much of a burden that put on people, while the people who thought we could just hand out extra money to make up for rising costs had their hopes dashed, too.