"I have a new philosophy. I'm only going to dread one day at a time."
~Charles M. Schulz~
Why is it that it is so hard to look forward at a year instead of back at a year? I always wonder that.
It's been a month since the first day, and I'm already in a rut. Same schedule same day-to-day experience. It was Friday and five minutes until practice was over, and I passed with the rest of junior varsity, watching the freshman that had gotten moved up with envy. I caught the last pass and we moved in for a break.
"Tigers on three!" I shouted.
"One, two, three. Tigers!"
A normal break and we headed off to do chores: putting up balls, Gatorade, and taking down the net. After those we headed to the locker room to gather our stuff. I got mine and glanced in a mirror at my sweat-soaked tee and spandex. I yanked out my ponytail before running back through the gym to the back stairwell. I steadily traveled down until I reached a room with only a window in the door. I peered through the window and found the entire band sitting and talking amongst themselves, but nothing could be heard through the sound proof door. I opened the door and ran in fast to keep the director from seeing me.
Sango leaned against the other door with a pile of flags at her feet. I immediately scooted toward her to take up my residing spot after pulling my trumpet out of my cubby and sitting it at her feet.
"So what are we doing today?" I asked as I took another glance around the classroom.
"Seems like one of those seniors are itching to challenge you for your first chair. Think she'll beat you?" Sango murmured with a smirk, all the while keeping her eyes on the percussion leader.
"She doesn't even have a chance, and keep your eyes to yourself skank. You're practically eye-raping him," I giggled and playfully smacked her arm.
"Hey! Don't hate the player. I'm just keeping my options open," Sango grinned and bent to grab her pile of flags. I grabbed my trumpet out of the case and tucked my bottle of oil into my bra. We leas the pack onto the practice field and I applied my chap stick heavily before I started my warm-up.
We did a double high-five and sat down in our first position on the field. Our drum major finally made it to his platform and we began. On a percussion brake, Sango and I were side by side.
"Look at all the hot football tushies in the stands," Sango whispered. I took a look, had to double-take, and almost lost my footing as my body took itself through the sets and pulled me to the front for a solo. One of my friends in the trombone section came up and turned it into a duet and Sango took up her place behind us twirling her flag. She was so close that at times I could feel the material of the flag touch my back. The football teams' eyes focused on my and I closed my eyes, trying to keep the nerves down as I went from an extremely low note to an extremely high note and held it. I bowed my back as I started to run out of air and finally I was able to stop. The band froze and we all looked to the drum major for the downbeat and off we went again.
Once we were done, we bowed and motioned for the director to kick up the music. He blasted it and went back to reading his magazine, not really caring what we did now that we were done.
Sango and I immediately started breaking it down on the field, dancing our butts off and not caring who saw. The football boys just looked on in astonishment before they jumped on the field to join us. A few had cute butts, but only one caught my attention. He joined in the group of other brass and I was slightly disappointed. Still, a few cuties did join us.
After the cool down session, Sango took off sprinting to the band room, I followed right behind. We busted out in harsh laughter, barley able to breathe. We just couldn't stop because the jocks had turned into geeks.
Always with the random laughter we collapsed on the floor and tried to calm down our fading giggles. We sighed in content just as everyone else mad it into the band room, we thought these were some of the most exciting times of our lives, but we were wrong.
So wrong.