Bright Lights, Big Dictionaries: What It Was Like to Compete in Scripps

(I definitely remember at least one kid’s bio mentioned that he had built his own computer. I feel like mine probably talked about my dreams of becoming a writer and how I was super into playing the flute, but you’d have to check with my mom to be sure. She still has my Guides, tucked away in a scrapbook, because in case you couldn’t already tell, I am an only child.)

The actual competition took place on Wednesday (prelims) and Thursday (the rounds you see on TV), but they put you up at the Hyatt for the whole week, and there were parties and tours and ice cream socials and all kinds of other fun stuff. Unless you were super intense about the competition (or your parents were), it was pretty much just an awesome vacation. We met our Senator and toured the White House and Mount Vernon and a million museums.

At the end of the week, there was a big gala dinner with a dance after, and people went around signing each other’s Bee Week Guides like it was the last day of camp. I guess now they probably just add each other on Facebook. In general, there was never really much wariness or hostility going around, because you can’t tell who your strongest competition is; you end up just making normal connections and not talking too much about spelling, because of course, the most notable thing about you is also the most notable thing about everyone else.

The most lasting relationships I formed were with people I sat next to during the competition; it’s a relief onstage to have a connection with someone. One year, I developed a brief but intense crush on a boy from Florida. We kissed during one of the post-competition parties in the little room where the pay phones were and then never saw each other again. And I’m still friends with a few of the other people I met there—all incredible, gifted people. One graduated from Harvard. One worked for Tumblr. One is now a Wisconsin state representative.

But of course, the competition itself started to loom over all the touristy stuff and the new friends you were making about halfway through the week. Kids would study on the bus on the way to the National Gallery or the FDR Memorial, or skip those activities entirely to stay in their rooms with lists of words.

On the first morning of competition, my parents and I would have breakfast in the hotel coffee shop. I remember huge cheese danishes and superstitiously drinking a SoBe “Smart” drink even though I didn’t really like the taste. My dad was in the middle of quitting smoking that first year so he wandered around restlessly, and my mom worked out her nerves by ironing everything in our suitcases.

And then came all the waiting. There are at least 250 spellers every year (this year there are 285), competing in alphabetical state order, so if you’re from West Virginia there’s a lot of sitting there anxiously onstage waiting for people to get weeded out. The first few rounds were composed solely of words from the Paideia. I was extremely concerned with not getting out in those first couple of rounds, because that would mean I hadn’t studied enough. As long as I lasted past the Paideia words, I figured, it counted as a win. Also, I wanted to be on television.

I got lucky both times, advancing to Thursday’s finals. Once you make it past the prelims, everything gets a little bit more intense because you’re going to be on TV. They give everyone the same ugly white polo shirt to wear, with the Bee logo on it (my mom was so happy to have something new to iron), and the cameras and the lights are incredibly hot and bright and disorienting. You can’t see your parents in the audience anymore, because of the glare, and the words get harder—unless you go through the entire dictionary, there’s no way to really prep for those. You have to rely on skills beyond rote memorization: root words, that kind of thing. You’re allowed to ask three questions: language of origin, part of speech, and for an example of the word being used in a sentence. Sometimes that helps.

When you miss a word there’s a soft bell, which I guess is supposed to be less traumatic than a buzzer or something, but it’s still the worst sound. The pronouncer and the judges all look at you so kindly, but the feeling you get when the bell rings, the vertiginous sensation of everything you’ve been focusing on for the last six months coming to an abrupt halt, isn’t really one that can be ameliorated with a look. I said before that I never really felt much pressure (my parents are amazing and wonderful, is what that’s about), but being up on that stage and in front of those lights isn’t exactly easy, either. I never made it past the first TV round. The first year, “epenthesis” got me; the next year, it was “ranine.”

After the bell rings, you exit stage right and the staff escorts you to a little room backstage, where there are cookies (not great ones, in my memory) and Kleenex and some space to breathe or cry or whatever you need to do with your feelings before you go deal with your family and the press. Some kids would get really upset, and a staff member would go out into the audience and bring a parent back for them. Some just needed a minute before they went to face the world; some breezed right on through. Because all the regional bees are sponsored by local newspapers, most kids had their own reporter there, writing about their performance for the people back home. I can’t imagine that’s how it works anymore, but 15 years ago it was a whole press bullpen, with people filing stories over a bank of pay phones, and it was an overwhelming crowd to face when you’d just lost.

When you’re ready, after you’ve hugged your parents, you go back into the ballroom and watch somebody else win. Then you just want to get back to your room and change out of the polo shirt. After that, you want to nap forever; then you want to eat the biggest dinner. It’s a pretty draining day.

It’s hard not to feel like I peaked back then, in a lot of ways. I’ll never be nationally ranked at anything else. There’s a lot less positive reinforcement in life once you age out of formal competitions like spelling bees (though I did win an adult spelling bee in a Mexican restaurant a couple of years ago). It becomes harder to know what’s expected of you. The 285 kids competing in this year’s Scripps National Spelling Bee know what’s expected of them, and all of them have already excelled at it just to get to this point. No matter who wins on Thursday, all of them should and will spend the week celebrating what they have already achieved, and carry around with them forever, like I do, the way it feels to be the best at something.

Image via Molly