We were well into football season now. The band was getting a lot of compliments. The marching band had never been so enthusiastically received before. It was performing with much greater gusto this year with more kids participating than ever before. More kids meant more of a spectacle out on the field. I guess we realized we were looking better when it was pointed out to us that the people in the stands watching were now waiting for the band to perform before running off to buy popcorn. In the past, the marching band was just there, nothing at all special, simply a time-filler between halves at football games, and a lot of people had just ignored it. Mr. T. hadn’t had a lot of enthusiasm for marching band, and the kids themselves lacked spirit.
I’d thought about that, and during the first week of drilling, had got with all the officers to discuss what we could do to fire the kids up, to make what we were doing more important to them so they’d work harder and be prouder of the band. No one had seemed to have any suggestions. It’d occurred to me that the lack of real energy in the kids might be coming from that attitude pervading the officers.
So I’d told them what I wanted to do.
“Guys, I see a lot of improvement going on every day. You all have your sections getting better, and not one kid has complained about how he’s being treated. I love the way you’re leading them this year. It’s so much better than before. The fact more kids have been joining the band is entirely because of what you’re doing and how you’re doing it. You’re all doing great. Thank you for that.”
I gave them a moment to smile at each other before continuing. “I want to thank each of you, and I want to reward the kids for working so hard. We have nine groups of kids on the field, and you guys are their leaders. We have to start preparing our first show in two weeks. At that time, Mr. T. will be giving us formations, and we’ll be working as a whole band, not individual groups. So, as a reward to the kids, and to you guys, during our last practice before we start working as a full band, we’re going to have a competition. I challenge each of you to show how good your own guys can do. We’re going to have a marching contest. And what you do is up to you. Close order precision drilling, small formations, whatever you can come up with and teach your kids. The group that shows the most pizzazz, the most spirit, the sharpest routine, the best marching, will win. All the kids will have to look sharp to be judged best, and I hope this gets them working harder, and caring more about what they look like. I want to see a lot of energy.”
Robert spoke up then. “Matt, what does the winning group get?” Robert was always a pragmatist. He wanted to know if whatever his kids won would be worth the effort.
“I thought about that. I could spring for a pizza party for them, but then it would be gone and done, and everyone would forget about it. So I came up with something else.” I pulled something out of an envelope I was holding.
“This is a patch. Mr. T. has given me permission to have the winning team sew this on the shoulders of their uniforms. It has the year on it, the school’s name, Marching Band, and then we’ll have embroidered the name of the winning group. The winning team’s officer’s name will be right below that.”
I showed them the patch. It looked decent. I knew what would sell them was the idea that their kids would have the patch, and no one else would.
They all looked at it, and while they were, I’d said, sort of off-handedly, “You know, guys, I don’t know that this is really fair. I’ve seen Keith’s group and they’re already looking pretty darn good. Jesse, you think you can get your kids up to that level?”
Jesse looked shocked. “Are you kidding? My guys’ll outmarch his any day of the week. You’re kidding, right?”
Keith snorted. “Yeah, in your dreams,” and I sat back and smiled.
The band now had enthusiasm and spirit and looked it. This new attitude was apparent from the way they performed on the field. They all were picking their knees up high when they marched and to the same height everyone was, their turns were sharp and crisp, their arm swings the same height and in unison. They’d drilled to show how good they could be, not because someone was telling them they had to. Out in front of the crowd, they responded to the roars they were now getting, instead of the polite and mild clapping of before. I also loved the fact that afterwards, in the band room, the noise level was high with kids shouting and laughing and supportively teasing each other. It was a happy, happy place.
◊ ◊
I’d just finished practicing and was about to start my homework. Damn, Econ was hard! And he made us read all the time! Then my mom walked in.
“Matt, you have a few minutes?”
“Sure, Mom. What’a you want?”
“Let’s go down stairs.” And she led me down the hall and then down to her office. She took one of the client chairs, and I sat in one next to her, turning it so I was facing her.
“Have you decided what colleges to apply to?”
“I’ve been thinking about it. I know I have to, and pretty soon. My problem is, I just have no idea what I want to do for a living. How am I supposed to know? I’ve never done anything. How do I know if I’d like to be an architect or a businessman or a sports agent or a newspaperman or—”
“Okay, okay,” interrupted my mom, laughing. I grinned back at her, but this was something I’d worried about, and something I didn’t know what to do about. How do you choose between careers if you don’t know what those careers are all about?
“Matt, most kids your age go through the same thing. A few already know what they want to do, but most don’t. However, you’re not as clueless as you think you are.”
“Yes I am, Mom. I don’t have any idea at all what I want to do.”
“But you do know what you like, and what you don’t like. For instance, can you see yourself as a newscaster, or photographer, or an actor, or a NASA technician?”
“Well, no. None of those interest me at all.”
“So you do have some idea of what doesn’t appeal to you. So let’s look at some things that maybe do. Tell me, Matt. Stop and think for a minute about this: what have you done that’s made you really happy, perhaps even proud of yourself? No, don’t just answer. Think. What’s given you a good feeling about yourself.”
I did have to think about that. I thought back over the past year. I mentally reviewed what had gone on. I thought about Kevin when I did that, but then pushed that aside and thought about what I’d done by myself. And I was surprised to see there was quite a bit there.
I’d had a job in the summer and had really liked it. I liked playing the clarinet, and I’d been in marching band last year, and that had been okay, and then this year it had been really great. I’d performed as part of a quartet for the school in concert band and that had been a scary but ultimately a hugely satisfying experience.
I told my mom about those things, and that I’d both liked them and been proud of myself because of them. But I didn’t see any career from any of them, unless it was as a professional musician, something I had thought about but wasn’t sure I wanted. I’d read about professional musicians, and for most of them, not all but most, especially classical musicians like I’d want to be, it was a pretty scattered, hit or miss, uncertain sort of life.
My mom wasn’t to be distracted, however.
She smiled and asked, “Do you see any connection between any of those things that made you happy?” The way she said it, and the gleam that was suddenly in her eyes, made me sit up straighter.
“Mom! You’re doing it again! You know, don’t you? You know what I should do! So, tell me! You’re making me figure it all out for myself again. Why do you do that?”
Her eyes had that intelligent glow she got so often. When she spoke again, she’d gone somewhat into her professional mode of talking. “I guess it’s my training. I was taught a person-centered therapy founded by Carl Rogers. His theory of practice uses the concept of mirroring the clients, accentually paraphrasing their statements in a way that helps them to see more clearly what they are saying and why. This idea is used a lot throughout many disciplines such as cognitive therapy, behavioral therapy, and dialectic therapy.”
She stopped and laughed because I think I was looking a little blank at that point. “Well, you asked,” she said. “His original ideas evolved into an even more popular technique called motivational interviewing. It’s used to help people who are resistant to change, like adolescents who believe they are right about everything. It’s possible, using it, to help someone discover what it is they may need to work on or figure out about themselves. It works best when the patient is receptive. If he’s guarded and not very forthcoming, it doesn’t work as well.”
It didn’t take much deep thought to know she was talking about me, to recognize myself as someone who’d been very resistant at first. I remembered how I’d resisted the thought I might be gay. And how her questioning resulted eventually in my having to face myself.
When I thought about that, I looked up at her, into her warm and knowing eyes, and smiled. Then I said, “So you’ve figured out what I should major in, what I should be when I grow up?”
She laughed, then came off her chair and hugged me. Sitting down again, she said, “Well, actually, I think you’re about to figure that out. Think about those things you said made you happy. Analyze them in your head, and then tell me what element in them really pleased you, really made you feel good about yourself.”
So I did. I thought about my summer job, and what had pleased me. That was pretty easy. I’d loved the fact that at first, my kids were just kids. They’d played soccer, and about a third of them were standing around, not having any fun, and I’d changed that. I’d got them all involved, and they’d all been happy then, and I remembered distinctly how that had made me feel.
I remembered the reading program, too. I had to think, but when I did so, I separated the reading itself from what made me so happy about it. It was that I’d come up with an idea that had ended with all the kids coming to the park every day. Attendance had been the highest that summer that it had ever been, John had happily told me. He’d said I had caused that. And how pleased that had made me. And then, when John had told me that from now on, the summer program would include a book-reading, well, wow! That, again, had been me, and now all the kids would benefit from it.
I thought about playing the Concertino. I’d enjoyed playing, but it was organizing it so Monica and Jason and Stephanie could participate, so they could share the limelight, that had made it special for me. And I started seeing what my mom had already seen.
I thought about the marching band then. I really was pleased the way that had gone. What was special about that? What made me feel so good? I looked at it, and then knew it was because I’d found a way to make the band better, and the kids happier, and that had been me. My doing. Because of what I’d done, what I’d figured out how to do, we had a band full of eager, excited, happy kids working their tails off and performing better than anyone had thought they could.
I couldn’t hide my smile from my mom.
“Figure something out?” she asked. How she managed to sound so normal, to hide the cat-got-the-cream triumph I expected to hear in her voice, I don’t know.
“I think so. I think what makes me happy is helping other people, but doing it in a way so a lot of people are helped, by changing things so what they’re doing differently becomes part of what happens from then on. I mean, for example, when I got with Stewart, I just wanted to help him, him alone, but I figured out a way that could lead to a permanent change in behavior for him. He’s going to work for John next summer. I think he’ll be a group counselor. He ended up talking to John a lot. I think I helped. He was already moving in the right direction, but I helped. I helped with Timothy, too. And I liked doing that. But even more than the satisfaction I got helping those two, I liked changing the environment at the park and in the band. I sort of feel my chest expanding when I think of those things.”
“So you’re telling me you like helping people, and like being in a position to change their environment so things are better for them. Is that right?”
“Yeah, I do like that. I like that a lot. I like the feeling I am creative enough to figure out ways to do that, and then see that they work. But how does that fit in with any career?”
“Have you thought about all these people you’ve helped? What strikes you about all of them?”
It didn’t take long to figure that out. “They were all kids.”
“So tell me, do you think you’d prefer helping kids, or just anyone?”
I knew that answer immediately. “I like helping people who aren’t really capable of helping themselves. Kids are like that. They’re often stuck in situations they just have to accept. I’d like to be able to fix those situations for them. When I’ve found out I could do that, I really liked it. It still surprises me that I’ve actually done that a couple times already. “
“Can you think of a job that would allow you to do it more than just sometimes?”
“Are you telling me I should be a teacher? I don’t know if I want to do that.”
“I’m not telling you anything. I asked you a question.” Her eyes were intent now.
“Yeah, you asked if I can think of a job that would allow me to control the environment of a bunch of kids, and to change it for the better if that were necessary.”
“Yes. Think about it.”
So I thought. And then my brain started working. “I could be someone who directs children’s programs. Someone in an administrative position working with kids. A, well, maybe a school principal.”
“And does that sound like something you might like to do?”
“You know, it does. When I met with Mr. Cochran, I left his office thinking of how I’d have handled that meeting, how differently I’d have done it. And I know there’ve been lots of times at school I’ve seen how things were done where they could’ve been done so much better. Often what happens in school isn’t for the betterment of the kids. It’s for other reasons, like improving adult efficiency, or cutting costs. Actually, I think I’d really like to be in a position where I could influence—heck, where I could control—how the kids were treated, how their days went, whether they were happy or not.”
“I think my work is finished here,” said my mom, grinning. “I think you’ve figured this out pretty well. Get a degree in education, then an advanced degree in educational administration. If you get a doctorate, you can probably write your own ticket. You’re plenty smart enough and motivated enough to get a doctorate.”
I jumped up and hugged her. Then I went up to my room and started Googling colleges that professed having excellent programs in education. My homework could wait.
◊ ◊
My birthday was October 11. I’d be 17. My mom had asked if I wanted a party. I’d thought about it. I knew a lot more kids now. I could have a big party, and I was sure people would come. Last year, I hadn’t had anyone to invite.
I’d thought about a party, then told my mom I’d like to have Becky and Kevin and Timothy over. I ate lunch with them every day, talked to them every day, and they were the kids I cared most about.
It wasn’t much of a party, but I loved it. We ate dinner, I had a cake, I got some presents, but mostly it was because I was one of four kids there who all liked each other. Dad had heated up the pool and we swam. Kevin and Becky teased each other, and I loved watching their eyes as they did so. I thought they loved each other. It wasn’t really a sexual love, but they connected on a different level than the one on which I connected with either of them. I had the feeling they always would. There was just something, something indefinable, bonding them.
Timothy was coming out of his shell a little this year. He was still quiet, he still spoke the least of any of us, but he was more relaxed, especially when he was with us. Kevin had even begun teasing him a little. It was very gentle, and I could tell Kevin watched the effect of what he said. Last year, Timothy would have been devastated by this. Now, he smiled. He knew we accepted and liked him; he knew the teasing had an affectionate undertone.
When the rest all left, Kevin hung back. Up in my room, lying on the bed, he kissed me, then lay with his head on my chest. Why did everything feel so right when he did that?
“We’re back to being two years apart now, Matt,” he said, and sighed.
“We will be most of our lives,” I said.
“I’m trying to wait.”
Oops. I didn’t like the sound of that.
“What do you mean? You said before that you were going to wait.”
“Yeah, and you told me not to.”
“Yean, well.”
He was quiet. So was I. I wished he hadn’t said that.
◊ ◊
We were sitting at lunch. We’d played our last football game last week, and concert band was about to begin. Mr. T. had asked me what I thought about the clarinets this year, and we’d talked some. He’d also asked me about playing the Mozart this year. I’d said I’d think about it.
Becky was being teased by Kevin about Ryan. She’d gone out with him a few times in the summer, and now their relationship was pretty exclusive. She wasn’t taking any crap from Kevin about it, though. She gave back as good as she got
Timothy was watching, as usual. When I’d engage him in conversation, he’d respond, but as soon as I stopped, his eyes would go back to Kevin. Again, as usual.
◊ ◊
The Christmas Concert this year was a little different from past years. This year, we combined the school choir with the band and performed the Messiah. There was some flapdoodle about a religious program being performed at a public school, but someone convinced the school board this was a traditional seasonal performance of a beloved historic musical piece, and while it certainly had religious underpinnings, it was being done as a secular piece of seasonal observance, and that furthermore, we’d never before had at our school both a choir and a band capable of bringing this off. I guess they’d somehow hashed it out, because we did the piece.
When we returned to school following the holidays, Mr. T. asked me again about the Mozart. I’d thought of a couple reasons to say no, but he told me he’d canvassed the band and everyone in it had said they wanted me to play. So, I did it. I relearned the piece, and we played it at the Spring Concert.
Mr. T. gave a little speech before I came out, and it was way too laudatory, too embarrassing, and I was glad I wasn’t standing there beside him when he was pouring all that syrup on me. Then he came back into the wings and collected me, we paused for a moment, and then we came back out and performed the piece. It was great, and I got a lot of attention because of it, but somehow, I never got the feeling that I’d had when I’d performed with the other three clarinets last year. That had been truly special.
Throughout my second semester, my thoughts kept returning to the fact my high-school days were dwindling. I guess I got nostalgic at times, or perhaps even moody, because Kevin would make fun of me when he caught me at it. That didn’t happen as much as it might have because by April, I wasn’t spending as much time with him as I had been.
No, we hadn’t had any falling out. As far as I knew, we both felt just the way we always had about each other. It was just that he had a lot more friends than only me now. There was no way a kid as good looking as he was, one with a personality like his, one who was so outgoing and witty, was going to stay hidden at school, and he hadn’t. He’d made friends, and he’d gotten involved with several school activities, and while I’d been woodshedding the Mozart and not able to spend much time with him, he’d found other things to do. He was still doing them, and I had several senior projects to finish up. We just didn’t seem to have the time we’d had before.
One thing did bother me a little. Well, more than a little. Timothy was more chatty at lunch. And he frequently would focus his chat on Kevin, and it was in a way and about things where I was left in the dark. They seemed to have things going on that I didn’t know about, and their discussions of them started to sound like code to me. When they were talking, Becky would usually engage me, and so I couldn’t concentrate on what they were saying, but the more it happened, the more I found I was feeling distinctly uneasy about it.
There was some excitement now at school for us seniors. Graduation was getting closer. There was an undercurrent of anticipation. The senior class advisor called me into her office one day and told me there were four seniors who had all A’s throughout their careers there, and I was one of them. Because I’d taken so many AP classes, however, my GPA was higher than two of the others. Accordingly, they’d decided they were going to have two valedictorians, and I’d be one of them. I had to make a speech to the whole crowd attending graduation. At least there was one consolation; with two of us speaking, I was told to make it short.
I was home one afternoon after school and for the first time in two weeks, Kevin had come with me. We came into the house and my mom told me there was some mail for me.
“It’s on the table, Matt,” she called from her open office.
I looked on the table where the mail was kept and found a large envelope with a logo on it saying “Pomona College - Admissions” in large print and “Claremont, California” in smaller script. I looked at it without opening it for a moment. My heart was beating a little faster than normal. Kevin, impulsive and impatient as usual, said, “Open it, for cripes sake.”
So I did. I’d been accepted into their General Education program.
“I’ve never heard of Pomona College,” said Kevin.
“It’s not real big, but it’s supposed to be one of the best colleges in California. In the West, really. I’ve heard it called the Harvard of the West. Being small, it has small classes. I think only about 15 kids is the average class size. It’s also very hard to get accepted there. You have to have an SAT score well above that of most colleges to have a chance.”
“So I guess it’s a big deal that they accepted you?”
“It was my first choice. I didn’t want to go to a huge school, like USC or UCLA or Cal. This is going to be a lot more comfortable.”
“Where is it?”
“It’s in Claremont, which is just outside LA, east of it. It’s only about a two hour drive from here. Maybe less. It’s a medium sized city, something between 30 and 40 thousand, I think, but of course one city runs into another there, so you could say all of Southern California is just one big city. The neat thing about Claremont, though, is that there are a bunch of small colleges located there, and that it has a different feel to it. There are lots of trees, and they hang over the streets like they do some places in the Midwest and East. It doesn’t feel like most Southern California cities.”
He was quiet then. The more excited I’d gotten talking about the college and the city, the less excited he’d become. We grabbed a couple Dr Peppers and went up and lay down on my bed. He was quieter than usual. I finally asked him what was up.
“You’re really going to be leaving. I’ve sort of tried to forget about that.” His voice sounded much different from normal.
“Yeah, I am. And it’ll be for a long time. I’ll be attending Pomona for four years, and then I’ll probably go to either Cal or Stanford for my advanced degrees.”
He didn’t respond. I rolled over to look at him, and he had tears in his eyes.
“Hey, Kev,” I said softly. “I thought the plan was for you to join me. You’re only a year behind. I’ll be gone one year, then we can be together, if you still want that. You’re smarter than I am, you got the same SAT results I did, and you can still take that again and do even better. If I can get into Pomona, you can too. Have you thought about a major?”
He sniffed, then wiped his eyes. “Yeah, I have. I’ve known for some time what I want to do. You just never asked before.”
“What?”
“I’m going to be a lawyer.”
“Why a lawyer?”
He grinned. He didn’t light up like usual, but he did grin. “I figure somebody’ll need to be bailing your ass out of trouble, whatever you do, and I’ll be there.”
“Wiseass,” I said, tapping him gently on the shoulder. “So, you okay? You still planning on following me to school?”
He didn’t answer right away. He was looking at the ceiling, not at me, so I couldn’t read his eyes.
I said, “I was sort of counting on that,” but then Mom called up asking about the letter, and we went downstairs to show it to her, and he never answered.
◊ ◊
Graduation was held in the football stadium. They’d set up temporary folding chairs on the field, and we all marched in and sat down, casting quick glances up into the crowded stands around us, looking for parents and friends. Well, most of us did. I marched in first with the other dignitaries and was then sitting with them and the other valedictorian on the raised platform which had been constructed where one of the goalposts had stood.
I was nervous. I wasn’t good speaking to groups, and this was about as large a group as I could imagine, rows and rows of seniors in front of me, and parents and friends in the stands.
We’d been told to make our speeches short, no more than five minutes if we could. I’d thought the shorter the better, so had had no problems limiting mine to that.
When it came time for me, I stood up, hoping I wouldn’t tremble, and walked to the lectern where we were to speak. The crowd was quiet. I thought of speaking to the crowd before we played our encore in band last year. I thought of reading to all the kids, and the adults that had started coming for story hour, and felt a little calmer. I knew how to speak into a microphone. I knew how to speak to a bunch of people. I started in.
My voice didn’t betray me. I was able to talk without it shaking, which pleased me a lot. I spoke about growing up, about starting in high school four years ago as a little boy, and leaving the school not quite a man but seeing the possibility of reaching that goal in the not too distant future now. I spoke about all the great teachers I’d had that had participated in that growth, teachers in elementary school, middle school and at high school. I praised Mr. Tollini by name for giving me a chance to find and prove myself. Then I talked about all of us having learned here that to accomplish things in life we would have to work hard, and whether we went on to college or into the armed services or into jobs, we were going to be ahead of the game because our hard work, wherever we were, whatever we did, was going to lead to our future successes. I ended with an apology to the principal and teachers that when our senior class left the school, there would be a significant intellectual deficit remaining at the school. The other seniors loved that. I got the same applause the other valedictorian had gotten, and was glad it was over.
My last day of high school, when we were all excused and everyone was leaving, I stopped by the band room. Mr. Tollini was in his office, but he saw me come into the room and came out to greet me. I couldn’t help but look at the board, where he had FINALE written. Just one word. Just the right one.
Mr. T. reached out to shake my hand. I hugged him instead, and then embarrassed the hell out of myself by starting to tear up. There were so many memories here. So many good memories. I hadn’t wanted to tear up, though. What an impression to leave behind! It was even worse when I found I couldn’t talk.
I didn’t really need to. He did the talking. “Matt,” he said, “a teacher sees students come and go every year. He gets used to it. It goes with the job. And we’re taught in school to never get too close to any student. It’s not professional. But we’re human, and we can’t help liking some kids more than others. And Matt, from the first day I saw you, as a freshman, I liked you. You were small, you were shy, you didn’t have much confidence, but you knew how to play the clarinet, damn you knew how to play that, and you were confident about that. And I watched you grow for four years. I’ve never been prouder of any student I’ve ever had, Matt, and I’m going to miss you more than you can imagine. We have a better concert band because of the leadership you’ve demonstrated, the desire to be a better musician you’ve shown everyone, and the help you’ve given everyone else. And with marching band, what you started is going to be continued. You’ve made a difference there that will continue and benefit the school and all the kids coming into the band for as long as I teach here, and probably longer.
“But Matt, for all that, it’s your heart I admire the most. You care about other people, and that’s rare in a guy your age. You care and you help them, and give of yourself to do it. That’s an incredible thing to see in a high-school student, something we don’t see that often. That’s what I’m going to miss most, your heart.”
Now I really couldn’t talk. I hugged him again, he hugged me and patted me on the back and told me to come see him whenever I was home from school, he wanted to keep up on what I was doing. I nodded, tears still flowing, and he told me that it was okay, and we’d talk again. I walked out, then slumped down so I was sitting against the wall by his door. Luckily, most everyone else had gone by then and I didn’t see anyone. Better still, they didn’t see me.
It took a full five minutes before I was able to get up and walk out. Kevin and Becky were waiting for me. We three walked home from high school together for the last time.