I’m at home on the high school parking lot. It’s the only space the administration grudgingly affords our marching band, and yet it’s ours. The band family lives and thrives off people supporting each other, we are there for each other when no one else is. I was elected by this family to be their band president last spring, and I have been completely changed. Despite the flashy title, I am still just one member of this 140 strong group, and I am still pushing to fulfill the responsibility placed on my shoulders.
The marching band season starts in August each year with a week long band camp. The first band camp was where I began to understand what real work is and why we all do it. Burning calves from standing on the platform of your feet, sweating so much it runs into your eyes, giving one hundred percent of your everything, were the things I learned. Band taught me to give my all and in return I gained more than I thought I ever would have. Having an entire community at my back ready to support me is a high reward for a few seasons of the hardest work I’ve ever done. I understand now that I would
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I have found that being a leader means more often being a servant and volunteer. I don’t get much acknowledgment for the extra hours I spend every practice prepping or taking down the equipment. That's not the reason I do what I do. To put it simply, band taught me to care. Band taught me to care about my family at home, my family at school, and the random freshman I see struggling in the hallway. With this fundamental change in my attitude, I became a new person and since then I’ve only gotten stronger physically, mentally, and emotionally. Without this activity I would have been stunted, I would have remained the overweight introvert who didn’t fit in during middle