Staying at The Same Hotel as Your Friends at Tournaments

I like hotels. I like carrying room keys in my back pocket and then whipping them out and opening the door like magic. I like walking down long hallways and feeling like I own the place because I slept there last night. I like hotel lobbies, especially big ones with giant chandeliers. But my favorite part of hotels is the elevators. And there's nothing more enjoyable in an elevator than having that silvery door slide open to reveal someone you know. Someone you totally didn't expect to be there. Someone who is either wearing a suit or pajamas.

What's also fun is breakfast. I mean, breakfast is always fun, but especially when you go downstairs and find a bunch of your speech and debate buddies eating Belgian waffles and sipping orange juice together. At a tournament last season, they had a smallish breakfast area, and when I was there, every person also eating was from my club. Ok, there were a few exceptions, but those people were in speech and debate too. It was fun.

I like when you realize you know your neighbors. My club often stays at the same hotel at each competition, or at least a lot of us do, and one time a bunch of us ended up on the same floor. It's fun to wave to people you know who happen to be staying near you, or even right next to you and you don't even know it until you both head down for breakfast at the same time and then share the elevator.

One last fun thing about hotels: sleepovers. I went to a tournament this year without my parents, so I hitched a ride up with one family and stayed the night in their room. The other nights I crashed with another family, and rode back home with them. It was super cool. I had those two families and a couple others who sort of adopted me, making sure I had a ride to and from the tournament each day and making sure I had food. Like, breakfast.

You're homeschooled, and you like... that.