Power Tripping

Karen and I are being pulled to coach some UST teams. Between the two of us, we can probably end up coaching a third of the colleges in the school.

The weirdest thing about this is that Kenneth--my egomaniac ex-coach--used to be my age when he started coaching us.

The way we looked at him was so extreme. It's like he was ten years older and was so balanced and thought out and sure because he was fucking older. In retrospect, it was just four or five years, but your that young anything over 20 is considered ADULT.

And now here I am, in the same position. Nearly all the debaters i've lectured to think i'm sort of diety (or, as Karen is fond of putting it, "debating god-dess") and they have that bright eyed look when they listen to me talk.

It's amusing, but at the same time I remember how I was when I was training for my first competitions.

Of course, I wasn't as enamored as they are. I was a cocky shit of a debater who thought she was fucking good the first time she made a speech.

My first time out, Kenneth's only comment was "Pretty good" and I told myself i'd make him eat his words...and he did.

But that's not the point.

Having these kids look up to me like i'm this genius is weird when I feel like such a runt.

I'm good, I know i'm good, but I never once felt that I reached the level that I dreamed to achieve when I was competing. Though in retrospect, even if I did stay in the sport, I don't think I would have anyway.

I was always afraid of that one girl who was better, which was why I never really made an effort to be the best. Because if your number one, the expectations go higher, the stakes get harder, and I didn't want to deal with being the best in one hand and having the possibility of losing in another.

I think I deliberately made myself miss a debate on my last dialectics simply because I didn't want to be number one. By losing the 1st position, I didn't have to perpetually worry about that girl who would have been number one except she didn't compete.

Of course, by sabotaging my chances, I managed to give the new Number One a complex. Everyone knew I deserved that place, and she spent half the time in the awarding ceremonies wanting to give me the fucking medal and started telling everyone why I should have gotten it afterwards.

Maybe I could have done the two of us a favor by winning and sparing us those stupid thoughts of "what if"...

Now i'm 24, and i'm older, and that privilage card called youth that gets me through a lot of scrapes is deathly close to expiring.

And I am fuck-ass freaking out.

To be honest...i'm scared of turning out like my coach, who spent most of his days power-tripping with us and messing with our psyche's.

And I'm scared that these kids will look up to me, and expect me to be this person which doesn't really exist. This uber debater, this really great person, this...adult.

Because really, if this is adulthood...then damn, there's a lot of shit to be worked out before Ault-Kriszia will truly be me.