The Year I Stopped Being Invisible - 31. Chapter 31

We arrived at Foxrun High School at around 2:45, greeted by the sight of dozens of other busses from around the state disgorging competitors all decked out in suits and nice dresses, debate teams carrying catalog cases full of evidence, speech teams rolling large stacked Extemp file boxes on metal carts, and the drama kids pantomiming their various characters.

All business, we hurried into the school and located the cafeteria, which was the epicenter of tournament activity. I saw a few kids from different areas whom I knew from middle school tournaments, and went over to renew our acquaintances, chatting amiably until I saw Mr. McRory gathering our team together, a stack of poop-books -- our slang for the booklets containing tournament schedules and sectioning -- in his arms.

He handed them out to us and I admired what a nice job Foxrun had done with their presentation. In middle school, the sectioning sheets had been a few pieces of ditto paper stapled together, but these were really nice volumes, spiral-bound with an embossed version of the school crest and "1981 Foxrun High School TFA-IQT" in a distinguished-looking cursive font on the cover.

TFA-IQT stood for Texas Forensic Association - Individual Qualifying Tournament. It took so long to say "tournament" (and "tourney" sounded impossibly posh), so we all generally called tournaments IQTs. I flipped to the list of schools to find our code so I could figure out the
sectioning.

Polk was school 21 at this IQT, and I knew that I was assigned the letter G, with Raymond and Robin being A & B, Kathy C, Carter D, Jim and Roger E & F, Mark H, Cindy I, Linda J, Pablo K, and so on. I was rather surprised to see that there were forty-eight high schools participating, some of them -- like Chamberlain -- with so many debate teams that they had competitors coded up to 14ZZ.

I flipped to the first day's scheduling, which read as follows:

Friday
3:00 - Deadline for late registration.
3:15 - LD, NCX, CX, CCX Rd. 1
4:15 - LD, NCX, CX, CCX Rd. 2
5:15 - LD, NCX, CX, CCX Rd. 3, DA Prelims.
6:15 - Extemp draw for ME & WE Prelims.
6:45 - DI, HI, OO, ME, WE Prelims
7:40 - Impromptu draw for first speakers in prelims.
7:45 - LD, NCX, CX, CCX Rd. 4, PR, PO, IMP Prelims
8:45 - CX Double-Octos, LD, NCX, CCX Octos.
9:45 - DA Quarters, CX Octos, LD, NCX, CCX Quarters
10:45 - DA Semis, CX Quarters.

The debaters began to hustle to their rounds, while I could relax a little, as Linda and I wouldn't be up with our Duet until 5:15. I saw that all the individual qualifying events had been crammed in at 6:40, and checked the sectioning to see if I would have time to get from one room to the next without running. Luckily, I was speaking first in the Oratory room and fifth in the Humorous room, so I wouldn't have to bolt.

I decided to go watch Pablo's first LD round to lend him support. He was going to need it. I raised my eyebrows as I saw his debate bracket.

Room 241 - 21K vs. 14A.

Holy shit! Pablo was going up against Chamberlain's best debater, Bobby Merman, who had stunned the tournament world the previous summer by winning Nationals as a sophomore. This was going to be brutal, I thought, as I raced upstairs to Room 241. He would need all the encouragement he could get.

When I slipped into the room and headed for a seat near the back, it was almost full. All of Chamberlain's non-debaters were crammed in, along with Bobby's legendary coach, Len Donovan and his wife T.C., who coached drama at the same school. I had obviously missed the coin-toss to determine sides, as I saw Pablo furiously scribbling at his table to the left -- my right -- of the podium, the side reserved for the Negative position. He would be the bleeding-heart liberal this round, letting Bobby play heartless prick.

Bobby was checking his evidence cards methodically, his wire-framed glasses sitting low on his aristocratic nose, his jet-black hair perfectly combed without a single stray to ruin the professional effect. His suit was Brooks Brothers, his shoes were Armani, and the glasses had to be some ridiculously expensive designer brand as well. Chamberlain was a very wealthy school, its students probably the most well-heeled public school kids in San Antonio, and Bobby was flaunting his wealth and class. There was no telling what kinds of things gave you an edge in public speaking, but appearance was definitely high on the list.

The time-keeper held up the "10" card, signaling the start of the debate and Bobby's ten-minute 1AC (first affirmative constructive) speech. He was, as usual, polished and poised, clearly outlining his case in support of the resolution, with each point perfectly supported by carefully-selected evidence cards. As the time-keeper flashed the 0:30 card, he brought all of his points together in a stirring, emotional conclusion, ending with another perfectly-suited quote.

Pablo's 1NC surprised me with its eloquence. I had never seen him speak before, and had to admit that he was extremely effective, making a strong counter-argument to Bobby's case. It was only during the 3-minute cross-examination period when Bobby began to show his true championship form, grilling Pablo relentlessly and pointedly about the ramifications of his position, that I began to worry.

Bobby's five-minute 1AR (first affirmative rebuttal) was ruthless, picking apart every point of Pablo's case, and astutely building on a couple of his nervous answers to the cross-examination to paint Pablo as just what he'd feared -- a bleeding-heart liberal whose "insistence on subsistence" would tax the country into ruin and create a permanent underclass.

Pablo's cross-examination of Bobby and subsequent rebuttal was not nearly as strong. In fact, I felt he was being overly-deferential to Bobby, perhaps a bit star-truck at debating the reigning National Champion to attack his arguments as strongly as Bobby had gone after his.

While Pablo's case -- that society needed a safety-net to prevent people from falling through the cracks and that supporting Bobby's position would create a "culture of cruelty" -- was okay, it's not the argument I would have used. It was too bleeding-heart and not pragmatic enough, and the judge was an older male who didn't look as if he was buying it at all.

It also surprised me, since Pablo seemed to be a staunch conservative. I knew he supported the resolution personally, and perhaps that led him to make a negative argument which was basically a collection of every bad stereotype about liberal thinking. Debaters had to be prepared to make strong arguments on either side of an issue, and I felt that Pablo was hurting his chances by not putting out more reasoned and substantial points.

After their second rebuttals, Bobby and Pablo shook hands and thanked the judges, ending the round. Bobby looked confident, Pablo looked whipped. I joined him at the Negative table, helping him put away his notepads and evidence files. Pablo seemed happy that I had attended, but as soon as we left the room, he looked at me ominously and shook his head.

"He kicked my ass right back to Polk," he muttered. "I hate this topic."

"Aw, you weren't that bad," I said. "I really like your speaking style, and your 1NC was really good. You also finished strong. That Jefferson quote is great."

"Yeah, not good enough."

He walked away dejectedly, trying to get psyched up for his next round, which was only a few minutes away. I decided to go outside for a cigarette, where I found Kathy and Mark smoking by the school flagpole.

"Well, hello, Little One," purred Kathy. "Come to join us in a life of vice and crime?"

"Too late." I lit a cigarette, grinning. "How was your round?"

"Dude," said Mark excitedly, "she kicked ass. She debated some little dipstick ROTC kid from FMA and wiped the floor with him."

FMA was Foxrun Military Academy, which had a reputation for being very good in team debate -- Novice Cross- Examination (NCX), Cross-Examination (CX) and Championship Cross-Examination (CCX) -- but pretty terrible in Lincoln-Douglas. While the CX events focused on hard facts and policy proposals, LD was more values-oriented, and there was a general belief that its more abstract, philosophical focus was antithetical to the military mind. No one ever worried about FMA or LMI (Lorrimar Military Institute) when it came to LD Debate.

"That's great," I said to Kathy. "You think you can go 4-0?"

Unlike the other events, debate had four rounds of pre-scheduled preliminaries, after which the best competitors, by record and qualitatively-assigned speaker points, would break into the single-elimination bracket. This tournament would break to octofinals, which meant that 16 debaters out of about 200 would make the cut. A 3-1 record would be risky, and 4-0 would be the standard.

"I'd better go 4-0," Kathy replied haughtily, French-inhaling her cigarette while pointing to the poop-book in her hand. "I am paired with some real turkeys."

As Kathy stubbed out her cigarette on the flagpole and prepared for her next debate, Mark gave me a sidelong look with a shy smile on his face.

"Can I come watch your Duet round later?" he asked.

"Sure you can," I said. "We'd love to have you there."

"Great!" he exclaimed joyfully, and followed Kathy off to her round.

I finished my cigarette and wandered back into the cafeteria, where I sat next to Linda and Carter.

"Are you ready, Rick?" Linda asked.

"I'm ready," I said. "We're gonna blow them away. Who are we up against?"

Linda checked the poop-book for our section. It looked like this:

Room 136 - Section XIX
1. 31C & 31D
2. 5A & 5L
3. 36C & 36 H
4. 21G & 21J
5. 3F & 3H
6. 19A & 19E

"So there's a couple of A's in there," I said. "What school is 5?"

"5 is Brookwood and 19 is Cartwright," said Carter. "19A is Bill Miles, but you don't have to worry about him, because he's mostly a speech guy. And Brookwood is mostly ODBAs."

"What's ODBA?" I asked.

Linda laughed. "ODBA means Over-Dramatic Black Actors. Brookwood always does these really over-the-top Gospel-type plays with these really ridiculous intros. It's like something you'd see at a black church in Alabama."

"That's true," Carter added, "but don't get cocky. The judges seem to eat their shit up."

"How many teams break?" I asked.

Middle school tournaments tended to be much smaller than this one, with usually only four sections of teams in prelims, breaking three teams to semis, then three to finals from each of the two semifinal sections. This tournament had twenty- four sections of teams in the prelims, which meant 144 teams.

"They're breaking two teams to quarters, three to semis, two to finals," said Linda. "Not too bad. I'm glad they're having quarters. Otherwise they'd just be breaking one, and then two to finals. I hate hate hate tournaments like that. One false move and you're screwed."

"Well," Carter pointed out, "have you looked at Humorous?"

We did. All thirty-six sections of it, breaking one to semis and one to finals.

"Damn," I said. "We're good, but are we that good?"

"I guess we're going to find out," said Linda, looking out the window of the cafeteria nervously. "And guess who's going to watch us?"

I turned around to follow her gaze, and there, in the parking lot, was a dilapidated black Dodge Charger, with its driver nowhere to be seen.