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I got thrown into something this weekend that I wasn't ready for. Every day is a story. I'm Shannon Cason. I was invited to participate in a high school and middle school debate competition this weekend. It's called the Moja Debate League. It's a nonprofit that works with Detroit schools, creating competitions so kids can learn to articulate their thoughts and ideas through debate. And I was so happy to be asked to participate. Um, I remember growing up, we didn't have debate teams. I was. I always wish we had them at my school. I went to Southwestern and E course, and we didn't have a debate team. You had to get those public speaking opportunities, mostly at church. So the debate was held at the University of Detroit Mercy. And this is on the west side of Detroit, about a hundred young people in a large student union. And I listened to the announcer give directions to the teams and the judges and the moderators, all while these kids were talking. You trying to listen? And I followed the directions, went to my assigned room, and someone tells me that I'm the moderator for the debate now. I went through a few training phone calls with a Moja, you know, telling us what we'll be doing, but just, like, short phone calls, I didn't really know what I was doing. I figured I'd figure it out when I get there. So. But they're telling me that I'm the moderator for the debate. And honestly, I had no clue what I was doing. Uh, luckily, one of the women in the room, she had been involved with Umoja before, and she was giving me a fast track rundown of what to do as a moderator. Now the moderator kind of controls the debate, in a sense, and a lot of the scoring can be based on what the moderator decides. So this is the fastest lesson ever because we were supposed to start in, like, five minutes. And I kind of got it. I kind of got it. I was semi ready. The thing about me, I kind of thrive on cluelessness. I love cluelessness in the sense. I love being, like, thrown in the fire. And then I'm having. Having to figure it out. It's kind of wild, but I get an adrenaline rush from it. I'm kind of an addict in that way. So then this young man walks in the room and he says he's going to be the moderator for these debate teams and that I'll be the judge. So I had to go sit down. And it was kind of disappointing. It was kind of disappointing, but I accepted my spot as judge and I wasn't going to be A first time moderator. So I watched the kids. Some of the kids were strong debaters and some of them not so strong. For many of them it was their first time. Like they read straight off the paper with the folder in front of their face. You know, we all got to start somewhere. We all got to start somewhere. I know me and the judges, we encouraged all the students, we encourage. Who knows, I may have done something similar. If it was my first time moderating in that quick pinch, I may have done the exact same thing as them. I think it's important to start somewhere, have that experience of even sometime embarrassment because sometimes kids will have a rebuttals and they would just say I don't know, I don't know or just sit there in silence. That happened a few times. But it's important to have those embarrassing experiences because you grow from them. You, you know. But what really got me was the middle schoolers. So I had to judge a debate with the middle schoolers. It was should the voting age be lowered to 16. And it was two teams and they were battling it out. They were focused, they were debating, battling with words. One of the girls stood out. She was about 4 foot nothing. She came to the podium and, and head high and she spoke in a yell. She was yelling out her points, head, always high, supremely confident, with that loud squeaky voice. And I loved it. I loved it. Even, even though her team didn't win, I loved her. Now her mom kind of cornered me at the end of the debates, you know, by myself. All the judges had left and she kind of cornered me like why did my daughter's team win? And I was kind of stunned, you know, she called me on the carpet. Now I had to explain myself. And this is like I say, one of my favorite positions. I like the adrenaline rush of being caused on the carpet. I told her, you know, the judging was a culmination of all the judges scores and I judged it close. It was a close, it was a close debate. But the other team had more depth to the argument. Your daughter's team is stuck with that one point. It was one point that they had and they stuck with it. And even though she yelled it persuasively, 16 year old brains aren't fully developed yet. They didn't win. So ultimately she listened. Accepted is what it is. You live to fight again. Get them next time. But all in all for me it was an amazing experience seeing the kids debate and, and being a part of that experience, being called to the carpet even. And I did meet a few single moms in the process. It happens. Single mom information exchanges happen. But it was a great time. So the, the moment of meeting for me was you have to be ready. Even if you don't know what you're doing, even if you don't have all the right answers, even if you're totally clueless, still be ready and willing to go. So what's something that you wish you had access to when you were younger? And how are you providing those opportunities for the next generation? What's your story?