This One Time, In Band Camp....

Some of my proudest moments are directly related to my experiences playing the trumpet in my high school and college marching bands. I loved band. My love of it grew out of traveling to watch my brother march in junior college. It was loud, bright, fast, and exciting. It was just so big. But I think what intrigued me the most about it was the serious nature of the band members. It was cool to see 100+ college age students work, tirelessly, to put on a very complicated musical show. When they snapped to attention, their bodies rigid and still and faces as solemn as a funeral, I shuddered in anticipation. It was a powerful thing to behold at eight years old.

The weeks leading up to band tryouts in the sixth grade were some of the longest of my life. Basically, those interested in band would travel all the way (300 yards) to the big imposing high school campus to tryout. The tryouts consisted of trying to make a sound on a few various types of instruments and playing a very rudimentary rhythm on a snare drum. You were then assigned which ever instrument you inherently played the best. For me, there was a lot riding on this little test. I took it all very seriously. What if I nailed the flute? How in the hell could I show my face if I was naturally inclined to play an instrument that was less than manly. Maybe, when it's my turn to try the flute, I should just grab the thing and smash it over my head. Surely they won't assign it to me if holding a flute causes me to be a danger to myself.

And before some league of manly flautists starts keying my car or egging my house, you must understand that I'm not really dogging the flute. It's a perfectly acceptable instrument. The scary part of the flute is the case! It looks like an oversized make up compact. You can't look cool carrying that thing around. No, for me it had to be the trumpet. It was bright, loud, and usually carried the melody.

Wow, I just exposed a lot of my personality issues with that revelation right there. It seems that my "please notice me" insecurities found a way to control every decision I've ever made.

Anywho, I never really gave much credence to the whole band geek moniker. I mean, it made sense, but for me it was like calling a white guy a cracker. It really didn't hurt, and I didn't really mind it. For me, I was doing something that I felt was too cool for non-band geeks to understand. We worked hard, played some cool music, and were very competitive. We competed every Friday night "against" the opposing band. We competed at band contests to get good scores, and we competed against each other for the highest chair position in our sections.

But today's stories have nothing to do with competition or music, or even marching. Today's stories revolve around the band bus. In junior college I had two very interesting experiences on the band bus traveling to and from away games.

My times at PRCC was some of the most exciting times of my life. Everything was accessible. There was no safety net. I was on my own. Little did I know exactly how scary being on my own could be.

One Thursday night we loaded up the buses and traveled to Decatur, MS to East Central Community College for a football game. We stopped at a little town called Newton, about a half hour from our destination, to grab a quick dinner at McDonald's. The band usually traveled in three coach buses. Unlike high school you weren't really assigned seating. You could pick your bus and ride with whomever you wanted.

After our dinner we all lounged out on the grass, and I began to feel a rumbly in my tumbly. I knew that once we reached the campus I would be relegated to using the restroom in some stadium bathroom with wet floors and urinal troughs. That was not going to happen so I looked at my clock and figured that the ten minutes we had before departure time would be plenty long enough to take care of business.

You know, for the slightest of moments, as I sat in the McDonald's bathroom with my pants around my ankles and heard the roar of the charter buses pulling out of the parking lot, I actually considered rushing out of the restroom screaming for them to stop. But, thankfully, the good people of Newton, MS did not deserve to be subjected to that sight. Nope, like a little Fonzi I stayed cool as a stranded cucumber and weighed my options. The sticks of MS was no place to order a cab, and it was probably too far to walk, so I was completely at the mercy of a stranger's kindness.

I shyly approached the counter and asked the cashier if she knew how far it was to Decatur, and what my best option would be to get there. She smiled and said, “oh, it's just up the road a piece. Tammy gets off in a few minutes. I'm sure she could give you a ride.” Whew, Tammy to the rescue. My relief was quickly dashed as Tammy rounded the corner and spotted her passenger for the evening. Now, I'm not going to be rude here, but Tammy kind of looked like a meth addict. She was 5'0” and about 94lbs. She had a wiry look to her and appeared 15 years older than her real age. The cashier asks if I'm willing to wait about ten minutes until she finishes her shift, and she'll give me a ride. She lives in Decatur with her parents and dropping me off would be no problem.

As Tammy's tiny little toyota truck tears out of the parking lot a wave of “I might be about to live out a horror movie” rolls over me and I begin to survey my escape options. Luckily, I haven't spotted anyone hiding in the bed of the truck with a machete, and Tammy hasn't brandished a single fire arm. The following is a transcript of the beginning of our conversation:

Tammy: So, you got a girlfriend?

Me: Uhh, yea.

Tammy: That's cool, I guess.

Me: Yea, she's nice.

Tammy: (excitedly) So, you're in a band?!

Me: Well, no. I'm in THE band. A college marching band. We are going to the ECCC football game tonight.

Tammy: (puzzled look) Oh, what kind of music do you play?

Me: Marching band music.

Tammy: (satisfied) Well duh, that makes sense.

At this point, her smiles and glances have gone from flirty to rapey. I begin to wonder if I can hold McDonald's responsible for sexual harassment. Nah, it would never stick. I change the subject and tell her that I'll soon be moving to a different college in Jackson. She gets REALLY excited and tells me how much she loves Jackson. She used to date a guy from Jackson after she got out of high school. Her tale of love and loss went something like this:

Tammy: I used to date a guy from Jackson. He was so great. I thought we were going to get married one day, but daddy told me I couldn't see him anymore, seeing as how he was a skinhead and all. I don't know why daddy didn't like him. I mean, daddy don't like blacks neither, but he said the skinheads liked fighting too much.

Yep, I'm going to die.

As we pull in to the parking lot at ECCC I open the door and begin to get out while the truck is still rolling. Tammy, obviously worried for my safety, slams on the brakes which sends me crashing in to the door and I collapse to the ground.

Tammy: “Oh Lord honey, are you ok?

Dazed, I hop to my feet, look for any witnesses, POLITELY thank Tammy for the experience, and sprint through the parking lot desperately looking for a familiar face. She sat there for a brief second and watched yet another potential love fade in to the night. Maybe, just maybe, Tammy is somewhere writing a blog about the time she almost bagged herself a band geek.

Laundry was not my strong suit in college. During my first semester at MC, it took me three months to realize that I'd been washing my clothes in fabric softener rather than detergent since the beginning of the semester. Sure, they smelled great and were ridiculously soft, but there's no telling the level of filth trapped in every fiber of my clothes.

At PRCC, I took my clothes home on the weekend to take advantage of the mom and dad laundry service. All week long I would pack my clothes in a mesh bag and haul it twenty minutes to my parents' house for a nice washing. There was, however, one article of clothing that never made the trip. I owned one pair of black dress socks that only served one purpose. I would wear them with my marching band uniform every time we marched in a football game. Upon returning to the band hall I would remove my marching shoes, shove the socks inside, and head out to whatever party was scheduled for the night. For a year and a half, these socks never saw a washer. At the end of my first semester, they stayed packed tightly in my marching shoes until the next August. When I pulled them out, it actually took some effort to un-bunch them. They were pretty stiff. In fact,they could probably stand up straight if I tried. I would describe the smell for you, but I was never brave enough to get them anywhere near my face.

One fateful Thursday night in November of my sophomore year, we were returning to campus from an away game. I had removed my marching shoes and devil socks and spread out across a bus seat, hanging my feet off of the arm rest. Even if my feet had smelled, no one would've been able to tell since the entire bus stank of teenage sweat and body odor. My girlfriend at the time was hanging out a few seats behind me playing truth or dare with some of the other girls and guys. I wasn't really paying attention so I had no way of knowing that one of her close friends requested a dare when her time came.

Not really awake, yet not really asleep I dozed off gently to the hum of the bus engines and the white noise roar of 50 young adults on a bus. That's when I felt it. The big toe on my left foot began to tickle and feel very warm. I opened my eyes and locked gaze with one of the most horrified faces I'd ever seen. Apparently this poor girls was dared to suck my toe. I always felt that she may have had a thing for me, but this was unbelievable. For God's sake, she knew I'd spent my evening marching on a football field sweating my butt off. What was she thinking? In that instant, her eyes told me that she was coming to the same conclusion. She was living the repercussions of her mistake.

That's when my thoughts shifted to the socks. I began to get the precursor to vomit where hot spit started collecting in the back of my throat as she shivered and pulled back from my foot. There sat my toe, covered in saliva, standing as a barricade between her face and mine. Both of us horrified at the confluence of forces that would undoubtedly lead her to gargle unscented bleach. She quietly stood back up and returned to her seat as if it wasn't that bad. That's what she wore on the outside. On the inside, which I could see when I looked in her eyes, she would've given her last penny for a sip of ANYTHING to drink, and her first born for some mouthwash. Poor kid. Maybe next time she'll think twice about trying to hide a personal fact and she'll just go with “truth.”