$ ^{9} $Wednesday, October 27. 1999
The University Daily Kansan
Section A·Page 7
a pageant's inner workings
lowered her voice and told me one of the contestants had liposuction.
So ... maybe the golden girls got a little help.
So... maybe the gibberish is good.
I sat in our dressing room, close to the wall we shared with the "professional" dressing room. I could hear conversations.
"Wow, we are going to be in my daddy's pageant?" I heard Beth ask.
Beth's father — the chairman of the Diamond Miss pageant circuit? It all made sense now. Beth had been bred to be a beauty queen.
I told Jamie about Beth's daddy. She showed me a Ford Explorer in the parking lot. On the side rear window, a logo had been imprinted: "Angelae's Academy of Performance Excellency
- Marilyn Busy, director." Angelae and her mother owned and operated a charm school.
Suddenly I was overwhelmed with all the professionalism. Beth's dad: the pageant lord, Angelaea's own charm school, Kristina and her 75 pageants. I felt intimidated, as if I was observing some secret society with its own hierarchy — its own nobility. It was a caste system. Beth and Angelaea had been part of this world since birth. I had been part of this world for six hours.
Iasked Jamie how she felt.
"I feel like an outsider," she said.
Back inside, Beth and Kristina said they had known each other since childhood. "You're in all these pageants, and you make all these good friends that you see all the time." Kristina said. "It's a pageant thing."
t was 6 p.m. One hour until the pageant. I re-set my hair and re-did my makeup. I had 54 minutes. I walked out into the lobby with the intent of learning the monologue. But I ran into my mom, and we sneaked off to talk.
She gave me a rose and a card: "To Katie, who personifies all that is good and true, lovely and beautiful." I cried with gratitude and relief. She wasn't psycho pageant mom after all. With this little confidence boost, I returned to the dressing room to perfect the monologue.
At 6:50 p.m., I was freaking out. I didn't know my monologue. My hair was ugly, I had a protruding pimple, and more than a dozen of my colleagues were going to see me in a bikini. With a spotlight.
But what was infinitely worse, the unthinkable had happened. All this had started to matter.
In our interview suits, the seven of us filed onstage for the introductions. I could not hear the loud, obnoxious cheering I had expected from my hooligan friends. They must be late, I figured. My ego
Back in the dressing room, we were in a frenzy to change for the swimsuit round.
would not allow the thought that they had stood me up, left me to go through this alone.
change for the swimsuit. I put on my trusty red bikini and the ugly taupe heels that I borrowed from Miss Flint Hills 1999 to look like everyone else. I turned around to see Barbara duct-taping her breasts, making a U-shaped tape shelf to create some formidable cleavage. Jamie was spraying adhesive to the rear
midiable cleavage. Jaime was spat out of her suit so it wouldn't slip. She sprayed it in her mouth. She sat on them.
of her suit so it wouldn't slip. She sheared it in her shoes too, so she wouldn't slip out of them.
shoes so, too. "I'm aiming for the "full pageant experience," I glued, too. I refused to tape, however. It just looked too painful.
Walking across that stage in a bikini is probably the gutsiest, most difficult thing I have ever done. I walked fast, but I made eye contact, and — with the aid of Vaseline on my teeth — I kept a smile on my face.
I needed no greeting notecards. My friend said:
vassine on my teen - a key
I heard no rooting, no catcalls. My friends still hadn't
Only the talent and evening gown competitions remained. I thought I finally had the elusive monologue under control, and I hadn't
not a problem. When the master of ceremonies called me onstage for the talent competition, he had to pause until the cheering died down.
"Go team," he said, laughing at my tardy supporters. Finally. It was just the boost I needed. With a grin on my face, I launched into my "A Midsummer Night's Dream" monologue. I don't know how I acted it, but I didn't mess up one word.
up one word. We changed into our evening gowns. I piled my hair in a bun.I thought about the upcoming question.
This was the one area I thought I owned. At just 15 percent of the composite score, it couldn't win it for me. But at least I could show the audience and the judges. It was the smartest. And
I walked onstage to the hoots and whistles of my friends. I walked over to the master of ceremonies, an affable gym teacher from Burlington High.
"Katie," he said, "you are currently a reporter for the University Daily Kansas."
I cannot correct him, but I could hear snickers from the newsroom delegation. Possible questions ran through my head: Ask me why I wanted to be a reporter, maybe what the
I was not ready for the question from hell. "So, Katie, if you had your own newspaper, what would you call it and why?"
hardest story to write was. I could handle either swimmingly.
What a random and impossible question. My jaw dropped. I blanked out — most newspapers have geographically based names. You don't just make them up.
"What's it about?" I blurted.
What's he about? 1. Beloved.
This befuddled the master of ceremonies, who had been just reading off note cards.
"Ibh." he stammered. "sports."
Duh. So much for being the smartest
OK, pick the one aspect of journalism of which I am completely ignorant. "Well ... I guess Sports Illustrated is already taken." I said, trying to stop my voice from shaking, "I would call it Sports News or Sports Gazette, something that would appeal to a large group of people."
I am so much for being the smartest. I rushed through my second question, an inquiry about voting stuff, and hurried off-stage. I had to admit defeat. More disturbing. I had to admit to giving a damn.
We all waited backstage for our cue to return onstage for the award announcements. I kept waiting for someone to yell "gull hug!" or compliment everyone or in some way institute some sense of camaraderie. It never happened.
We were seven strangers, who bonded over Pizza Hut salad for a day, sharing liner but little else. We filed onto stage for the coronation.
Surprise. Beth won. She feigned astonishment, and so did the rest of us. Then came the clichéd "Here She Is, Miss America" and countless pictures. And then it was finished, and we scattered. We have never come.
the group ing never came. I rushed out to meet my friends and my mother. Both were much more bitter than I was.
other than I was.
An hour and a half later at my house,
we celebrated. My friends made fun of
all the other contestants and repeatedly declared the injustice of the final question. Midway through the festivities, my roommate walked downstairs.
"So how did you do?" Ashly asked
"So how did you do?" Ashly asked.
"Well, I didn't win," I said, "but I got a cool trophy." I held up the eight-inch trophy that every contestant received.
"Sweet," she said. "Let's put it on top of the TV." My trophy still stands atop our Sony. One great conversation piece and a bit of shameless self-promotion.
Above: Topeka junior Katie Hollar ponders a question posed to her by master of ceremonies Richard Crall.
Richard G. Loomis
Middle: Miss Flint Hills 1999, Jeanne Anne Schroeder, right, crowns the new Miss Flint Hills, Beth Polston.
It's a pageant thing.
For left: Stopping for the judges' approval, Beth Polston poses in her swimsuit.
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