Speechless

by David Chan

“In that moment I felt like a cup filled with anxiety and fear to the brim, and as I spoke, I was slowly dripping it out.”

My father has always been very ambitious. Even when the odds are stacked against him, he still pushes through and tries to achieve what he wants. Amazingly, he got what he wanted most of the time. When I was younger, he always told me stories of how I have to keep trying and never give up, despite how farfetched anything seems. Out of all the lessons that my dad would teach me as a kid, this one has stuck with me for the longest time, and I believe that I inherited my ambitious behavior through my father.

On August 28, 2018 an email sent to my whole school with the title “So you want to be a Roche?” At my high school the term Roche represented a role that is similar to student council, where I would be working with another potential candidate for my class with school events and leading activities. I'd been procrastinating on running for student council for many years, so I decided to finally step into the challenge. In the email were instructions that had to be completed in order to be a possible candidate. And over the course of two weeks or so, I completed every instruction and attended every meeting required. The final step was the speech and voting.

Now I had all of my ideas and plans for this school, but I had to somehow write a speech that included everything within a three minute timeframe. I wasn't quite sure how to format it, and that made me wonder when election day was. So I went onto my computer and checked the same email to find the document that had all the rules and deadlines on it. Once I opened it, I saw the date for when election day was: September 29. I had plenty of time, nearly a whole month to create the speech. Knowing this, I went at a relaxed pace.

A couple days later, my friend asked me if I was ready to give my speech tomorrow. What? Give my speech, tomorrow? I thought he got something mixed up with the dates, so I replied saying that Election Day wasn't until September 29. Later, an email was sent out saying that Election Day was in fact tomorrow. I started freaking out. Why was it tomorrow? The dates on the document said it was September 29th. By this time, it was very late at night and I couldn't form a good speech in just an hour. I was at such a low level of confidence to the point where the next morning I emailed the school saying that I wanted to drop out. I said that I didn't have a speech done and I wouldn't be able to say anything at the election.

During one of my classes, a Rabbi from my school came up to me and asked me if I was still interested in running. I had a feeling in the back of my head to say no since I had already dropped out of being a candidate, but I stuck with my initial feeling and said yes. He told me that he could give me my candidate statement for a reference for speeches. I accepted the offer and he left the room while I was going to my next class, thinking about what I did. I had a sense of hope and regret. Am I going to be able to improvise this speech correctly? How would I use a bunch of bullet points of ideas into a speech? Thoughts raced through my head as I walked into my next class, just an hour and twenty minutes away from elections. After class, the time finally comes. My heart was pounding out of my chest, and I walked over to the theater where my classmates were sitting.

I was given my statement and sat in the front row. I glanced at the statement I wrote, just filled with bullet points and no proper structure for a speech. How was I going to do this? By the time I finished thinking about what to say and when, it was my turn. I went up onto the stage, still feeling uneasy. My mind was still in panic, but when the timer started, I spoke freely. In that moment I felt like a cup filled with anxiety and fear to the brim, and as I spoke, I was slowly dripping it out. As I approached the end of my speech, I spoke with much more confidence. I did it. I passed the hard part and all I had to do was wrap it up. I finished my speech and went back to my seat. I felt a rush of relief flow back into my body as I sat down.

When elections ended, I walked over to lunch where I thought about what happened. I started the day hopeless, wanting to give up and without a speech, but ended the afternoon with hope. Later that day, an email was sent out to my school with the results from the elections. I had won. Even in my sticky situation, I managed to pull through near the very end and achieve the role that I wanted—all because of my father. All because I chose not to give up.