9/10/04

Its one of the moments that every parent waits for.  Your child's big moment in the spotlight.  If your child is a big sports star, it might be the time they score a touchdown or hit a homerun.  If they're a cheerleader, it might be the time they have their big routine in front of an audience.  Of course, if your kid is in BAND, its the first time they play at a football game....opening game....first game o' the season.
The football team has been practicing until their honed to a fine edge....the band has been practicing until the instruments seem to flow as one with their hands....all are ready for the debut performance.
So my son Andy is not "technically" in the marching band.  He's one of the guys who's in the band who gets to drag the giant drum around the field.  It reminds me of one of my favorite Woody Allen movies---Take the Money and Run.  There's a great scene early in the movie where Woody is recalling his troubled youth and you see the Woodman playing lst chair--in the marching band.  And you see the band parading down main street during some holiday, and there's Woody....trying to catch up while holding his cello and dragging a chair along with him.  He stops...plays a few notes, then runs to the front of the line and sits his chair down again.  Really funny stuff.  Anyway, back to Andy Poe-Bowdren (or, as I call him..."A.P.B.").
So he makes his first appearence on the field at the beginning of the game, playing the Star Spangled Banner and does a nice job nailing the big cymbals together.
Then its halftime, of what was a pretty decent game, and its time for the marching band's big show.  So as the members of the MARCHING BAND parade out to the middle of the field--using military like precision, Andy and a few other kids are walking into the stadium dragging the giant drum and the xylophone, among other things.  And A.P.B. puts his drum where it needs to go, looks back and sees a young girl having some trouble rolling the giant gong onto the sidelines.  So, being the gentleman that I taught him to be (?!!?), he runs over and basically takes over for her.  The girl is obviously thankful and starts heading over to whatever her particular instrument is....and ole APB keeps rolling the gong.  And then.....it happens........
The string holding the gong onto its base snaps, and the gong crashes to the ground.
Only...it doesn't just crash to the ground....I mean....it CRASHES TO THE GROUND.  There's this echo that reverbarates seemingly over the entire campus.
And APB has this look of blind panic on his face....the old...."what the fuck do I do now??"  I'm telling ya, if I had a camcorder, I coulda won a million bucks with this video.  And at that very moment...after we were done being mortified for APB, Kim and I look at one another.....and just break out laughing.
"I'm so proud right now," I said.
And, since of course one of my favorite hobbies is giving my children crap....I go down to the fence at the end of the halftime show as the band is walking off the field.
APB is walking past me and sort of nervously glances over....
"Hey!  Try not to drop the gong this time," I said "supportively".
"The string broke!  It wasn't my fault."

And at the end of the night, I told APB that he had done a good job....and that I noticed just how fast the girl he had helped had bailed out the minute that string broke.....and yet I couldn't help but wonder just how perfect it would've been to have had the band break into the old T-Rex song "Bang a Gong" the minute that the string broke......man, sometimes parenting can be big fun.  And the best part is, that Andy is usually no fun giving crap too, because he usually never lets anything bother him.  Now his sister on the other hand, she begins marching band NEXT year....and she lets just about EVERYTHING I do bother her.....OMAN.  Big fun!!

Later,
jeff