I was really, really lost when I found you. I was in my life science programs, struggling to see the purpose in what I was studying. Those days, I had a lot of time to myself to think about what I wanted. And all I remember thinking was “I need to get out”. I came to you as an escape. It was a complete accident, too. I was in my first year of university when stumbled on an Eventbrite link that was titled “The Osgoode Cup”, and naively thought I could just sign up if I wanted to. No experience, no partner, no team, no idea what to do. In a way, that reflects how much I was looking purpose outside of school.
You were so nice to me in my first competition! I hadn’t read the case in the slightest. I didn’t even know there was a competitors package until maybe three days before the competition. I remember meeting with my partner Irene the week before the competition and attending my first scrim. Boy, that was terrifying. I didn’t submit that day. Instead, I tried (and failed) to scribe what I was hearing. There was just too much I didn’t understand; how to even begin? That scrim was with a pretty advanced team too, so the feelings of inadequacy compounded. There was no way I’d do well in this.
Thank you for turning that unpreparedness into a feeling of liberation instead of fear or pressure! It was such a blissful feeling to go into that competition – having paid so much money and invested considerable time – without the feeling that “I had to perform well”. Moot had nothing to do with science, certainly nothing to do with my then-ambition of becoming a doctor. In my mind, I felt I could fail at this and that my world would be completely okay.
Did I fail? Well, I did submit sitting down. When I got a hard question in Round Three, I remember just going silent for 20 seconds and being so relieved when the judge said “It’s okay counsel, you can move on”. I made a new argument on Right of Reply. I had no idea that the Respondent was supposed to “respond” to the Appellants, and I remember being so confused why the Respondents in one of our rounds were scribing what we were saying. To top it all off, I asked my captain Ashvini after the day ended “where the dropbox was so I could submit my submissions”. I viscerally cringe every time I remember her face contorting in confusion.
Irene and I didn’t make Day Two, but took an Uber to watch the finals on Day Two. I remember us walking into the moot court room and being so confused as to if the finals had happened or not. The finalist teams were joking and laughing together with their team, and Irene said to me “theres no way they look this chill if finals haven’t already happened”. I agreed! But finals indeed hadn’t happened yet, and so I had the privilege to sit there and watch seasoned advocates approach the same case I had tried to wrestle with. That round gave me my first view into what real mooting looked like. There was so much of a difference between me and them. They had case law off the top of their heads, poise under a slew of questions, a deliberate speaking pace and a certain finesse about them. It was so inspiring. I remember trying to take notes of the round on my phone, but being so captivated that I just sat and watched them. The mooter I was most inspired by that weekend was wearing an orange suit; for the next couple weeks, I talked and thought about “the orange suit girl” a lot. Moot, you gave me one of my first peer role models! Someday, I want to reach out to and tell her about the impact she’s had on me. You also introduced me to my first group of friends through that weekend, which was the beginning of a community.
I often think about that first experience. It passed by in a blur of fun and bliss, and yet it also has never left me. It didn’t exactly light a fire in me in the sense of wanting to perform better, but it was a symbol of what I wanted to be eventually. Moot was going to become the space where I wouldn’t see success, but was a team player. I’d be free to cheer people on at every juncture because I didn’t care if I did well or not. It’s be happy for and unthreatening by their successes.
I remember contemplating if I should leave you after that first competition experience. After not much thought at all, I decided I shouldn’t. I’d already gone through all the trouble of trying out and paying the membership fee that I may as well stick it out until the year was over.
Then came my second competition. It happened to become my first Day Two experience. Day Two, I realized, was its own beast. I didn’t appreciate the full force of what was I was experiencing or what was happening. In some ways, that weekend was about just surviving. I had barely made it past UofT’s internal qualifier! It was too much for me to contemplate trying to beat teams from other schools. All I knew was that I had a partner that made me smile, a couple pieces of paper, a notebook and a voice. And that this had to be enough. It turns out it was enough to get me my first win.
The aftermath of that win was when I started to think that you and I weren’t on transiently-crossing paths. I felt like a sponge in the aftermath of it, wanting to do better and learn from people at every juncture possible. At that stage still, it wasn’t rooted in a need or even desire to win. I just wanted to keep “going”; doing myself and my partner proud, and feeling I’d done a good job.
You put me through a lot the next few competitions, in a different way than I’d hoped. Those next couple competitions showed me just how hard it was to put up a good round. I felt myself regressing; crumbling under the weight of the bench’s questions, contorting case law to try seeming more well-read and having trouble responding to opposing counsel’s arguments. Heck, I struggled to even come up with responses to my own arguments. I started to feel jealous of my first win; how could it have come so early on in my journey? I came to truly appreciate how “nonchalantly” I experiencing that. I now cared more about moot, and yet was seeing less of the types of progress I wanted. My partner and I kept fighting our battles on Day Two though, each improvement slow to come and hard fought. Feeling the resentment and frustration growing, I ended up taking a six-month break from you.
Though things were turbulent skill-wise, it was quite the opposite community-wise. I was officially attached to the moot community. You also gave me a long term partner and good friend through all of this. I think about her a lot; I see her in candles, Brookside chocolates and glass water bottles. Her and I were endured tough disappointments and tried to overcome self-criticism together. One of the best things you’ve given me, moot, is the ability to grow so close to her. Without a doubt, she’s one of the all-time best mooters to ever grace the circuit.
Coming back from that break, I had such mixed feeling towards you. I was now a co-captain of my school’s moot team. I’d dreamed of being able to call myself “Captain” of anything. I’d never taken up leadership in a competition team before. But instead of excitement, it dealt me a lot of shame and doubt. Even just running tryouts for the incoming team was hard; before me, countless pre-law students who had longsince wanted to moot were fighting for a spot on a team I had found by accident. In those moments, I wondered: when will everyone find out that I’m a fraud? That I don’t actually know what I’m doing, that I’ve just ridden on my partners’ back or been on luck’s side all this time? My first competition as captain was especially brutal to get through.
With time though, you helped lift that stress. At the least, you helped me see that the stress was reaching a level of numbness that I simply couldn’t bear more of. I was reaching my limits, and I had to let go. That next competition cycle, I got to lucky! I partnered with a new and incredible parter who reinvigorated my love for you. That partner and I spent late night calls contemplating the public interest purpose behind the case rather than focusing on submission writing. The case law and policy argument drafting, which was typically an action item on the schedule, became organically integrated into our discussions. By the time competition weekend rolled around, there was such oblivion in my body that I treated rounds as another prep call. That weekend brought arguably one of the hardest rounds I’ve ever faced, which you allowed me to experience without fear. (There was disappointment after the round, but no fear during it! So a step in the right direction.)
Then, you gave me another big challenge a month later. Against many odds and after feeling a little dejected after Day One, you taught me that adapting to feedback is more important than the perfection of what you have preplanned. Day Two of that competition was truly terrifying, and I still look back in awe of how hefty the mental battle we fought truly was. Self doubt really only serves to hurt you. Thank you for letting me have a great last experience mooting with my first role model that weekend.
Onwards, now to my senior year. I got to work with all news partner who, like my other two partners, has pushed me in unique ways I’d neer imagined. With every feeling of incompetency this time though, there was – possibly for the first time – a voice that told me it was more important to learn from her than to beat myself up over not already being where she was. How liberating it is when you view people like that! Everyone is nothing but a collection of knowledge that you can tap into. I walked into competitions for the third and last time as if they were a second home to me, feeling so completely at home it was ridiculous. Every moment this year, however, is obscured the way one’s eyes being full of tears obscured their vision. It’s as if I was never able to see the task at hand clearly this year. Maybe that is because you stopped feeling like a task, or because I just didn’t have the energy to appreciate that I should be nervous or feel anticipation.
I wish you’d let me cry over the fact that mine and your relationship is now over. Every time I try to, there are no tears. Why? It makes me feel so foolish and emotionally out-of-touch at the same time. Perhaps it’s denial that we’ve already parted, and you are a part of my past. And you wouldn’t be the only one I’ve felt this with: only this morning did I appreciate that I am truly graduating university soon. Too many things I love are dying at the same time, and my heart just doesn’t know how to bear it.
Who am I without late night case reading, moot meetings at night, writing my case breakdown or practising my intro in my bathroom mirror? And the community I’ve made! It feels as if I constructed a vibrant world of my own, and now the villain of time is killing it. Who am I without you, moot?
Part of me does not want to except that my last competition has already come and gone in a sleepless, panic filled and rollercoaster weekend. In these moments, I regret not having a “emotions recorder”, some way that I could save and reply the moments of fear and exhilaration and satisfaction and pure joy I experienced yet again. But another part of me knows that the stupid saying “all god things must come to an end” is made for moments like this. As much as I hate it, you and I must now go our separate ways.
You gave me a home when I needed it. You gave me the warmth of a loving community, brought back my spirit for learning when I thought I’d long been gone and a space to grow and mess up without pressure. If anyone had told me years ago that this was possible for me in this life, I would have said you were living in a dream. But I only met you, moot, because I knew I had to leave the path I was on. It was such an uncalculated risk, and it carried infinite reward.
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