Hi! This is Marcelle, and he’s absobloodylutely drained right now.

This has been a very interesting weekend...

Last Saturday, Marcelle was at his brother’s and mother’s joint birthday party. What can he say? The food is simply great, as ever. Well, beyond that, Grace and Marcelle were together again, and they left in a while. Marcelle had a debate tournament to worry about on the following day, but he’ll get into that in a little while. Suffice it to say for now that he just had a lot of things to work out with his academics. Ah, well.

Nonetheless, Marcelle then went off the next day for the debate tournament: Powermatch, to be exact. Now, throughout Marcelle’s debating career, he has run into three kinds of partners:

1. The partner who is better than Marcelle. Obviously, Marcelle listens and learns from the so-called master. Classic example? Any time Marcelle debates alongside the varsity people.
2. The partner who is on par with Marcelle. Usually, this is the kind of partner who is on the same wavelength with him. Ergo, they jive really well. Classic example? Carlo Marquez, Marcelle’s partner on two different occasions, both breaking past the elims, once breaking into the finals. Another one is Rach Syfargo, who broke into the semis with Marcelle as well.
3. The partner who is not as good as Marcelle. What’s great about this kind of debater? They listen to Marcelle.

Here’s the problem in Marcelle’s Powermatch run this year: he got a type 3 debater who DOESN’T freaking listen to him. How annoying is that? It’s simply frustrating to see how your carefully-laid plans completely fall apart because your ruddy partner did not know how to put two and two together. It’s simply annoying to have someone who’s so asinine about maybe being a hotshot in high school debating, assuming it’d take him places in college. Oh, never mind that Marcelle’s been doing this for FOUR years IN COLLEGE, and NEVER FAILING TO BREAK INTO THE SEMIS AT THE VERY LEAST. Dammit, you bastich! You have the gall to assert yourself and think you’re God’s gift to debating? Marcelle wishes he never picked you to be a partner because your folly cost the both of you. Worse, it’s Marcelle’s last chance to win that ruddy thing. Fact is, you can always try to screw things up next year. But no, you decided to do it during Marcelle’s swan song. How thoughtful.

Debating was never Marcelle’s life. Unfortunately, there are things Marcelle still has to prove to the debaters in the ADS, because he knows few of them have ever really given his capabilities much of a thought. He wanted to prove his naysayers wrong and show them that he had what it takes, but all it took was the worst partner ever to ruin everything. Marcelle gets no respect. No respect at all.

Needless to say, this is the first time Marcelle didn’t break past the eliminations.

It was frustrating, really. The first debate was good because Marcelle defined the motion quite adequately, and it netted them second place. The motion on Intellectual Property Rights defined in terms of only the medical industry was a great debate to work with, and of course, if two varsity members were in the equation, then it’s fairly obvious that they had the edge that Marcelle didn’t. But still, that was fine. Second place wasn’t so bad.

And then the next rounds happened.

The second round on giving minors the death penalty was miserable. Marcelle decided to let his partner go first, and not only did he make a total fool of himself, Marcelle’s partner even ignored every single idea he was given on the debate, AND even completely neglected to extend the ruddy debate! How moronic can that be? He was acting like a silly parrot, repeating everything the previous speakers already discussed! It’s amazing how people like this get into the Ateneo, just like someone Marcelle knows who’d sooner buy a game than pay up the money he owes someone he likes to call his ruddy “best friend”. Bastiches, these two are, hrrmm?

The third round was the nail in the coffin. Marcelle made an EXCELLENT speech on why Japan should not have a permanent seat in the United Nations Security Council, only to have his partner completely ruin it by not only listening to nobody but his asinine self again, but to actually DIRECTLY INSULT one of their opponents by calling him “Wimpy-brained”. It would’ve been fine if it were one bit witty, but nope. Wit is too much of a challenge for Marcelle’s idiotic partner. Do you realize Marcelle has never spoken like this about ANY of his past partners, no matter how bad it was? Yes: it was that annoying.

All throughout, Marcelle’s only glimpses of consolation were the other nice people he had to speak to, especially the former champion of Powermatch who has a shot at this again, as well as the numerous nice people who looked like they came from ICA (But most actually didn’t.)...

It was also good to hear from Carlo Marquez again, Marcelle’s former partner. In a fit of indignance, he texted the guy, who’s already in Law School. Good times all around. There’s a guy who believes Marcelle should’ve been in varsity. Ergo, if he doesn’t even get to be allowed to try out, what a ruddy travesty!

*Going back out of character...*

Dani has been such a boon to me after that debating nightmare. You might say that I was so ticked off that even the other debaters sensed it right away. Some of them were genuinely surprised I didn’t break, but then took it back when they realized who the Hades my ruddy partner was. I’m glad she was around to listen to me vituperate, and then we even ran into Amby from Radio 1 there. I owe Dani big time, I suppose.

I spoke to Abby today. She’s doing fine, so it seems. All the stress over the thesis is pretty annoying, though. Nonetheless, I’m glad she’s been nice to speak to me, and I hope she’d be there as well this Saturday, along with Bro. I had to tell her that if she became Cum Laude and I didn’t, that’d be really depressing. Nonetheless, I wouldn’t want to think about that anymore...

*jaded* has been really nice to me lately. I suppose I can’t help but be grateful she’s starting to reach out to me again, and I really appreciated it when she gave me an SMS, no matter how seemingly insignificant it was, it does help a bit. I’m way over being angry at her for past issues, but the pain is still there. It still makes me feel bad every time I recall that I missed her 18th birthday, and I’m sorry to say this, but the pain is still there. I don’t hold it against her, nor do I hate her, but I’m still hurting. Because I know she will never turn 18 again. And I miss the times we just hung around Berch’s and talking from four until seven in the evening. I miss the person I once called my best friend. But for me to have to be the one to reach out is not a matter of pride on my part: it’s a matter that brings me much pain.

I hate being like this. I know we’re going to work this out, because I don’t think either of us can possibly say that the friendship meant nothing, even if I was not part of her special night, or if I was assumed to be “just like the rest”. There were words let out on both sides that could’ve been better off unsaid. I know where I went wrong, and I give her enough credit to know where she did. It’s not impossible to repair, but the fact remains that in the here and now, I am hurt. Because the pain was just too much for me to deal with. I hate being this sentimental. I hate having to miss a person like her, because the power to work this out lies in her hands, and no amount of missing her on my part will ever allow me to wield that chance to fix things myself, lest I bleed myself to death emotionally in the process.

I am such a sucker for punishment. I seem to love letting myself get hurt like this, and it just completely makes me feel like a wretch.