it's true, you never really leave high school

Oh. My. God.

This weekend? There could be drama.

Wait, let me back up.

My high school music experience was less than stellar. My first year, our instrumental program consisted of one band with maybe twenty people in it. My high school was only offering the band director position part-time, which made it difficult to find good candidates. My first trombone instructor actually considered applying for this job until he found this out. Apparently he also had a fascinating conversation with the school principal about why you can’t really march with only twenty people.¹

So, for my first two years of high school they had newly hired this one fellow. And, he was incompetent. Staggeringly so. So much so that even a high school freshman could tell he had no idea what he was doing. There are many anecdotes I could recount... like the time he wandered off during a playoff game to get a cheeseburger and left a student conducting the pep band for the entire second half of the game. Or the time he made my normally calm and laid back friend so furious that he punched a wall and broke his hand.

The entire band hated him. Those of us that did honor bands were ashamed to admit what school we went to, and couldn’t bring ourselves to applaud when asked to thank our music teachers. I almost quit band because of him.² Even now if you mention his name to any of us that were in that band, you will probably see open hostility... and as bitter and cynical as I am, I am rarely actually hostile. After he left, a formerly retired band director took over, and it was like night and day. I couldn’t believe what he managed to do with our sad little group in just one year, and it only made me feel more cheated.

We later heard through the grapevine that he had taken another teaching job with a middle school, and then had had a nervous breakdown. And we laughed. The people that didn’t know him thought we were horrible... all those that did remember him laughed along with us. The last I heard, he was doing construction.

This could be shrugged off as the biased memories of an overdramatic teenager.³ And, you know, we weren’t exactly easy on him. You’d be amazed at the shenanigans you can get away with when you’re 14 and your teacher doesn’t know what he’s doing, and the trombones were the worst offenders. Now I look back on those days and shake my head a bit. I was the token voice of reason in that group,⁴ but I didn’t really try as hard as I could have, because I had lost all respect for our teacher.

However. My undergraduate school just happened to be the same place that he got his teaching certification for this state. And the faculty there remembered him. Oh, did they. And they took great pains to make sure I understood that he had never actually attended the school as a student and that the music faculty had had no say in the certification procedure. I believe the words "we all knew he shouldn’t have been teaching" were used.

Oh, and also? Apparently he had to do his student teaching twice... because he failed the first time.

I could say more, but you probably get the idea.

Anyway. The other day I had to go pick up some music for a gig I’m playing this weekend. And as I was initialing the sign-out sheet, guess whose name I saw under second clarinet?

I actually physically backed away from the clipboard.⁵

Now, it’s been a long time, and I would personally rather just let it all go and never speak to him again. I have this feeling, however, that he’s going to come up and talk to me and act like we’re all buddies, and I’m going to end up biting my tongue and being politely insincere. Or, you know, maybe he blames my classmates and I for being less than cooperative. An actual fight would be hilarious, but I rather not deal with the resulting drama. I’m not a big fan of drama, and prefer to avoid it whenever possible.

So, here’s hoping he never looks behind him. I’m shooting for quiet and anticlimactic here. However, if he does decide to start some shit?

Oh, it’s on.⁶

1. My band never marched. It was the only good thing about high school.[↩]


2. My youth symphony is what saved me... I don’t know what I would have done without them.[↩]


3. I know, this is redundant.[↩]


4. and because of that I never actually got into trouble for any of it[↩]


5. It’s a good thing no one was in the office at the time, because that would have looked quite strange.[↩]


6. Note: this will probably not happen.[↩]