Roboprom Part 2: Do you have a cell phone?

Before I go any farther, let me take a moment to emphasize this post's major plot-point. As much as I can't stand cliches in writing, and as much as I know it's cliche to go and say, "if I hadn't done this, then none of that would have happened," grace me with the chance to do it, anyway. I do firmly believe that of all the choices and decisions that took place down the line, this particular decision I made, (or am about to make for those of you just following along) was the single most major deciding factor in my leaving Washington.

The significance of this point in the story holds deep meaning for me, and so it is only appropriate that you also carry this meaningfulness before you read on. Let me then implore you to close your eyes, take a moment for yourself to reach this state of mind, and then let us continue on our way.

Bear in mind, also, that all of the girl-numbers I kept in my phone were from friends and classmates. Sure, I was used to chasing girls in my own school, and I had my own ideas of what "bold" was, but never had I gone up to an unfamiliar, attractive girl, dropping the "Can I have your number?" question cold like that. In this case, however, I knew I only had this final opportunity to pursue this girl, which was the dreadfully motivating push I would need.

Part of me saw no reason to do anything at all, given that even if my approach and introduction to the girl went well, the only way I could see her again would be in the unlikely event that both of our teams somehow qualified for the prestigious and exclusive world competition. Another part of me saw the chance as a way to ensure that even if I found disappointment, she would be gone forever, and I could continue with the proper priorities of a young, strapping man on his way to forge new roads in college.

So there she was.

I saw her sitting at the front of the arena all by herself. At the very front of the seating was a five-foot retaining wall with about ten inches of room on the top that could obnoxiously seat often unknowing spectators in the view of those in proper front-row seating. Her team played a match just a few rounds before, and most of them had returned to their seating. She decided to go down early and sit up front in anticipation of her team's next match.

I knew that once the final matches concluded, myself and the adjacent robotics enthusiasts would all return to our seats for the awards ceremony, only exiting our arrangements to ziptie our robots and go home. I would get no better time than this to speak to her.

In light of my calculated figuring of how not-worth-it this was, I proceeded with a determined shuffling out of my chair towards the girl. Fortunately for the development of this plot, I didn't do any such dreadful thing as to ponder, think, consider, or calculate any further that might lead to my reconsidering of the matter.

Each shift of my leg found my foot one stair step lower until the aisle she was sitting drew me into a ninety-degree turn and a press of my toes that propelled me to her. Depressing my weight, worry, and all of my hope onto that retaining wall, I opened the conversation that would change my life:

"So, is your robot up next?"

She looked back at me with the brown eyes of a girl who was about to change my life, and said all I could have ever expected her to say:

"Yeah"

And I replied, "Cool. What's your name?"

She told me what her name was, and we shook hands. So I asked her if she had a phone. Seemingly caught off guard by the rather obvious question, she laughed and told me that of course she had one.

So, I asked her the only appropriate subsequent question,

"Do you think I could have your number?"

I never was able to capture the sugar-sweet delight that embraced my nervous request. I remember her pressed, glowing cheeks. She was smiling as she gave me her cell phone number, and I smiled, too while I took it down. We were yelling at each other because the arena was so loud, but I don't remember it any differently than a quiet conversation in the kitchen. In the minutes before her next match started, we found each other in our shouts, asking only the most important of unimportant questions shared by two strangers passing in the night.

Tragically, the moment met its end in the shape of her friend returning to the front for the upcoming match. It followed with a blur of dancing, cheering, standing, sitting, mingling, and moving, that all stopped as the whistle rang out, signifying the start of the final match.

I smiled some more, and the competition was over. Through the awards ceremony, she and I slid our fingers across phone keys in the dance of blissful, unknowing inexperience. I didn't hear a word of the ceremony until the announcer's familiar drawn-out pause ended with enthusiasm through the concrete arena. It cracked my scattered attention like a pot.

Her team qualified for the world competition.

Roboprom Part 1: Lunch in Portland

I've told the story of my experience surrounding the 2012 St. Louis Roboprom a number of times. I've told it in an art room, at a lake, over Facebook, at a party, in a laundry room, and most famously, on a stage in front of a crowd of strangers. Each retelling has been just a little different, adding a detail here, forgetting one there, but none of them have been entirely complete.

Being such a recent series of actual events, I've never known how to tie the bow properly when the unsatisfying ending bleeds into my present reality. Without being able to tell a proper ending, I still carry the narrative's weight with me. The girl, even in her absence has kept one of my eyes looking over my shoulder at the past instead of the now.

In the past, I've defeated hangups like this by writing them out in words, and so, naturally, I should also be able to defeat this story with words. I haven't yet wrestled with which details should be told, and which can be forgotten because there have been so many, and I've made no time for them all. Telling a satisfying ending always seemed so impossible because of the fizzled nature of the story's actual ending. I believe that I am capable of writing an actual ending. I'm taking this Sunday afternoon to walk towards an end.

It begins on a Thursday afternoon in Portland, Oregon, at lunchtime.

As a third-year member (at the time) of FIRST Team 2557, a competitive high school robotics team, 2012 was not my first year eating lunch in this courtyard.  I remember the small ache of my eye adjusting to the day's strong sunlight when I came outside. My team's color was the bright yellow meant to attract the eye for safety reasons on the road. Finding my team was no chore.

This year, however, a rookie team had chosen the same color, and was eating lunch ten feet away from my team. In the middle of both brightly-clad collections of aspiring engineers stood a solitary figure. What caught my eye first was the yellow plaid shirt and matching yellow flower clip in her messy brown hair. The way I've described how I felt in that moment involves slow motion, golden light, and a slight breeze from an on-screen love story. I was stricken, and there wasn't much more to say on the subject. I needed to know this girl.

Thursday was over before I could even attempt to grab at her attention, and so I steeled myself to talk to her on Friday. I only had time to wave hello before my weak knees, frustrated hesitance and upside-down tongue fell into Saturday without making any progress. While Saturday afternoon was busy laughing at me, I noticed the girl in a crowd from afar. It was all I could do to descend the bleachers into the communal shaking of movement to sound so I could ask her name.

I was in the dance pit, about 20 feet away from her, initiating a circle of movements produced in a very small, simple, repetitive rotation. Feeling strangely confident, I collected about 15 people into the group. The moment she joined in, the security of feigned confidence gave way into the awkward shuffle that broke my geometry into a scatter plot.

The music stopped, as best I can remember, the announcer cleared the field and called all of the seniors on for a picture. Pulling my eyes from her, I looked to my fellow teammates to take to our stage. I walked tall over the field barriers for the first and last time ever as a student of the engineering program.

On the way to my spot, I glanced to the side, and like a bell in winter, she rung out to my eyes, and I knew then this was also her last year. Mouth set just ajar with the words I had for her, I walked towards the girl, but was defeated by some nervous gravitation into a spot 10 feet away.

The Senior picture where she and I stood.

I wound up with some of my teammates, eyes glued to the back of her head, longing for and afraid of finally talking to her while the picture was taken. My disheartened self left the pit and found a seat on the bleachers, soberly investigating the structural integrity of the floor. As much of a miserable wall as I could build, she still pierced through my periphery, rising the panic of losing the chance to know her name. Each of those glances, then, forced the moment to its crisis.