Being a Third Year - The Third Year Chronicles #1

(This is the first in a new series called the Third Year Chronicles, in which I document the coming year as I, a third year speecher/debater venture through it.)

Ah. Novices.

August.  The month where we can finally call the coming speech and debate season this year, and confidently refer to the previous season as last year.  The month of writing speeches 3-4 months in advance.  The month debate club starts up again.  The month in which we clear out our debate boxes and speech binders, the month we create new files on Dropbox for this year.

The month I realize that I'm a third year now.

At the beginning of my second year, I admittedly still felt like a novice.  The stock issues were foggy, I didn't get a TP partner until October, and I still had a hard time finding cards. This year is totally different.  I have a (more than slightly amazing) partner.  I know the stock issues better than the back of my hand (I mean seriously, who has memorized the back of their hand? Who has time for that?).  I wrote a whole speech before August 4th, something I only planned to do last year.

There shouldn't be this big of a difference between second years and third years, but there is.  I learned just as much my second year as I did my novice year.  I'll probably learn a lot this year too, but it won't be the same.

Weird parts of being a third year:

1.  I can't remember which speech/debate camp from whichever year is which speech/debate camp.  (As in, I get things that happened at 2013 debate camp and things that happened at 2012 speech camp mixed up.)
2. My debate coach doesn't put me in the same lecture room as novices and 2nd years.
3. I know and can explain what all the stock issues are. (Even inherency. Shocking, I know.)
4. I prefer certain flow pads over others. (Forget legal pads. Short ones are where it's at!)
5. I can find six pieces of evidence without crying.
6. I am well acquainted with the walls at certain tournament facilities.

Cool parts of being a third year:

1. I get to teach novices.
2. Novices will look up to me.
3. I get to mentor a novice.
4. I get to help turn novices into unstoppable forces of debater-ness. 
5. Basically, novices will love me.
6. I understand permutation and parametrics.

In conclusion, we have seen that being a third year in weird and cool and different.  Novices will love me, and maybe 2nd years will too.  (Wait, all the second years are already my friends.  So I guess novices loved me last year as well.)

It's for all these reasons I strongly urge an affirmative ballot at the end of today's debate round erm...  blog post.