Regionals

Sorry I haven't posted in a while. Life has been very busy. Two weeks ago, I competed at the last "qualifying" tournament of the year. It was actually a STOA tournament, but it was the last low-level competition I attended. It was very fun, but even more fun was the Region X Invitational Tournament last week.

To make a long story short, I won my form of debate and the top speaker of that debate form, in addition to extemporaneous. My impromptu, persuasive, extemp, and debate have all qualified to NCFCA's Nationals, held in Boston this year. I've been chasing this goal for five years, and this one year, God blesses me so that all my events bar one reach this level. It seems unreal - it's overwhelming.

You know what's also overwhelming? School. I have gone from swimming in the stuff to drowning. AP tests to study for, essays to write, research papers to start and complete, books to be read and analyzed, college entrance SATs and the COMPASS tests for community college entrance, math homework weeks old, speech and debate to prepare for Nationals, and at some point I should probably start practicing violin again - considering I've only touched my instrument once in the past two weeks, since I've been out of town the rest of the time.

I'm having a marathon school-year. I've been looking forward to summer to relax and just chill, but even that seems to be filling up. Speech camp, possibly debate camp, mission trip to California, two nationals, and oh, let's see, the possibility of some sort of history convention. My driver's license. It's a lot. I'm starting to wonder when this is going to end. I can't see the end in sight, because next fall, I enter community college.

So, dear readers, if these posts start making less and less sense, you'll know exactly what's happening. My back-up marbles haven't shown up in the mail yet, and the current ones are currently fighting a losing war of attrition.

B