Final Four

The discussion was this: "Do we leave at six thirty, or do we need to be here at six thirty?"
"Be here at six thirty."
Twenty-six years ago, that was the conversation I had, or tried to have, with my high school band director. We had just returned from a morning of marching in Denver's Saint Patrick's Day parade, and I was trying to establish when we needed to return to the band room to make our return trip to Denver to play for the state championship basketball game. Looking back, maybe the right thing would have been to spend the five or six hours between gigs hanging out at the nearby Red Barn so I wouldn't possibly be late.
A little more background: In my senior year of high school I had ascended to the peak of geekdom. I was the president of Boulder High's Pep Band. This was an offshoot of the paramilitary group that was the marching band. Being in Pep Band was voluntary, and was not nearly so reviled by the rest of the student body. It may be that we didn't play hokey show tunes - we did "Smoke on the Water" and "Shaft." It may be that we didn't have a set uniform and showed up dressed as anything from superheros to a funeral party. But the most likely reason for our popularity was that whenever we played at a basketball game, the team won.
Okay - the team had won the state championship the year before as well, but the Pep Band was there too.
Of the two gigs that Saturday, the one that was most important to me was not the parade. Walking in a straight line for three miles playing the same song countless times was nothing compared with the excitement of being part of the crowd - leading the crowd to cheer on our defending state championship team. On more salient point: I was not then, nor am I now, ever late for anything.
I drove up to the high school that night at six twenty-five. I had three of my bandmates with me and we all watched the bus carrying the rest of the band and the cheerleaders pulling away from the school. We did what any outraged group of teenagers would do: we stared at the bus, slack-jawed, then ran across the street and pounded on the school doors to absolutely no avail. Even though we were wearing our costumes, our music and instruments were locked up inside.
We decided to drive down anyway, fuming all the way. How could they have left us behind? Conspiracy theories abound, but when we finally arrived at the arena, we talked our way in by explaining that we were, in fact, "with the band."
The game went on. The band played. We sat two sections away. Boulder High lost the game in dramatic, heartbreaking fashion. We drove home and tried to console ourselves with the notion that the loss had not come on our watch. The next Monday it was decided that a leadership change was needed for the Pep Band. This was not my idea. There was no process. There was no discussion. I was done.
I don't spend a lot of time on this moment in my life, but it was definitely a corker. And every year when basketball winds up around the country, I feel a little sting, and I check my watch.