Unpacking at home is always the hardest part. It’s the final step in acknowledging the end of a trip.
I got home a few hours ago from Mock Trial State Finals in Riverside, CA. It would be an understatement to say that the weekend was amazing because words cannot capture the chemistry that we have- there is never a dull moment with this team.
This is going to have to be a really short summary because I don’t have pictures for a full-length post yet (I only vlogged, so I’m going to steal pictures from Farihah’s camera)….
Long story short, we left Thursday after school. The competition was held at the Riverside Hall of Justice, which is a really beautiful court (and it was a criminal courthouse so the courtrooms were big and all had jury boxes!) Our first trial was Friday evening, followed by three trials on Saturday. Saturday was an insanely hectic day. It got to the point where we would rush out of a trial just as the verdict was rendered, wolf down some food that our coaches bought for us, and walk into another courtroom as the opposing side (we had to flip Prosecution/Defense each round).
On Saturday night, they announced the top 2 teams who would advance to the Championship round at the dance. We did not advance, but we were still so happy because we were all extremely proud of the performance we had in the four preliminary trials. We took what we had at County Finals and stepped up our game by a considerable amount. There was no better way for us to conclude our year.
At awards today, we had four pieces of great news!
- Our team got 13th place out of the 32 county winners in California!
- Alex Ethridge was named Best Witness in California as Detective Frankie Cooper!
- I was named Best Prosecuting Attorney in California!
- The courtroom artist from LA County won first prize, and her picture was of Michelle and Patrick in round 3. That means that this drawing of Michelle and Patrick will be on the cover of all the case packets next year as well as the official t-shirts!
The best part of the weekend was spending over 72 hours with the amazing mock trial team that I have come to love so much. I feel like everything I write about Mock Trial is just incredibly cliche, but it honestly comes from the heart. I fought back tears at many moments this weekend because this team means so much to me, and I could not be prouder of the work we have done and how far we have come.
Arcadia Mock Trial<3
