A Year With You's Been Worth It

One year ago today, I wrote this, and my life changed.  It changed a lot.  And it hurt while it changed-- also a lot.  Like all major remodellings, this business of knocking down interior walls and restructuring the roof was necessary to rebuild, to expand.

After standing beneath the seats of Block O for the third quarter of the OSU-Wisconsin game instead of prowling the sidelines by the Band as planned, listening to the thudding echo of the percussion, feeling the concrete heave, and watching the metal brackets bend, I am more apt to learn from the moment I'm experiencing instead of fretting over where I "should" be.

After watching a fifty-seven year old haul a mellophone up and down the hashmarks of a football field with people younger than her grandchildren, I am rethinking what my later years will be like.  They will be stompy.

After hearing a horn player shout my name from across the field just to administer a hello wave, I am reconsidering what the bullies who made my grade school years hell really knew, if they ever knew anything.

After seeing a nineteen year old's entire body heave with sobs after he was cut from the Band, I am grateful I'm not nineteen anymore.

After pouring a single glass of wine in four mintues into an empty digestive system, I am not doing that anymore.

After watching a twenty-one year old Drum Major who had been training for the position half his life walk quietly off the field at the end of his term, I am reconsidering my knowledge of heartbreak.

After watching women smaller, shorter, and slighter than I am chairstep in perfect time with their male counterparts, I am proud to have a uterus. 

After a year of their rituals, their sorrows, their surprises, their anger, their support, their secrets, and their music, I am... fuller.

And I am going to to my best to give them the words their lyricless world deserves.

Holding Pattern

My apologies while I recovered from a very (VERY) long fall and threw myself into another round of travelling to see family over the holidays.  I've seen your emails and messages, but there was some trolltastic activity over the past week or so, which meant I had to shut down the lines to keep us all safe and snug.  But, as always, yes I still love you.  There's a lot to say, but I'll have more time to properly say it in the coming days. 

Right now I'm preparing to join The Ohio State University Marching Band in Jacksonville for the Gator Bowl.  No, you can't come.  Yes, I'll take pictures.  YES I STILL LOVE YOU.

Geesh.

Reader Question Madness

What does Jason The Ridiculously Young Drum Major think about…

...the restoration of Carmen Ohio (Clyde, Xavier The Reader, and Githy)

...his final ramp entrance (JV)

...Ohio State’s bowl assignment/The Gator Bowl (many The Readers)

...being the leading man of this book (Heather The Reader and Tigon)

...whether he prefers football games or smaller performances like the concerts (BelleNation)

...Urban Meyer (MAAAAAANY The Readers)

...coaching people who are also his friends (GoBucks!)

...being an alum Drum Major (Savoy The Reader)

...Luke Fickell as head coach (roderick)

...his favorite performance of the year (Keck)

...the Michigan game (CarmenOhio, Yancy The Reader, and Compy)

Miss Belle, what was your favorite off-field D Row moment of the season? (sugarplum)

Did Our Jason see you at the bottom of the ramp?  If so, did that add any signficiance to the moment given the path the two of you have walked together? (Ned The Reader)

Mary Beth, what kind of Amazing Duo Adventures have you been having with Our Jason? (Greta The Reader)

This string of fairly simple questions requires, in true Blonde Champagne tradition, an incredibly complex response.

First, let me remind you that as I’ve mentioned before, one of the most difficult aspects of working on this book has been negotiating the emotional currents within this band.  Sometimes I'd come into the rehearsal hall and see an entire row not looking at one another; other days it was obvious that the whole Band was under a cloud.  I never delved into any of this, because 1) none of my business 2) not the kind of book I'm writing.  Besides, such sine waves are to be expected when dealing with a roomful of A-type personalites, all of whom are immensely talented.

That said, some of the questions relating to Jason and Drum Majoring in general, ones which don’t appear in this list, seem to assume that I interacted with him over the past few months more than I actually did.  In reality, we have not had a chance to sit down with one another since September.  The days flew so quickly that I surprised myself when I checked my notes and realized that.

Now Jason, I imagine, is decompressing from the regular season while taking finals.  I’m not going to barge up to him demanding his thoughts on stuff like this right now.  Maybe in the coming months or past tryouts he will be open to sitting down and speaking to some of this… maybe he won’t… but for the moment, let us leave the man to his textbooks, his PlayStation, and his eggnog.  He has more than earned it. 

Jason Stuckert is the Drum Major, but I sense that he strives to prevent being the Drum Major to solely define him.  He is a complex, more-than-meets-the-eye person who is more intelligent than he gives himself credit for. 

Jason takes his position as Drum Major extremely seriously and understands his responsibilities both to Ohio State as well as to the Band. It was important to him to avoid even the appearance of elevating himself over the Band as a whole.  He has learned well the lesson of some of his predecessors, lessons which now exist as warnings so embedded in the program that I heard them several different times from several different people: 

1) You can have a band without a Drum Major, but you can’t have a Drum Major without a band. 

2)  Cocky on the field.  Humble off. 

As spring became summer and summer became tryouts, our relationship underwent a significant shift, one which I was expecting.  Unless I badly misinterpreted, Jason seemed to increasingly express through his actions that he preferred me to remain for the most part in the background, and I fully understood and accepted that.  I think part of the reason was that he joined me in my goal to get to know the rest of the Band, and that wasn’t going to happen if I was forever huddled up with D Row. 

And both of us had, in the words of one of my longtime The Readers, $*#& to do.  In addition to rehearsals with the Band, Jason needed to tend to classes, his individual practice, responsibilities to OSU, D Row dinners, and bonding with the rest of the Band—he was quite dedicated to pulling all the rows together, and that meant spreading his time with all 225 of his bandmates throughout the season.  And I had notes to make sense of, courses to plan, papers to grade, fellowship and residency requirements to fulfill, posts to write, interviews to arrange and conduct, research to do, and bandsmen to feed as well as bond with myself.  You know....  $*#&  to do.

In addition, at the beginning of the season, I promised Jason space.  I did my best to keep that promise.  I don’t know how well I did.  I saw him very briefly at the end of each game day when he and Kyle Who Owns stood at the door of the Band Center as the members filtered past after dismissal.  Sometimes we happened to wind up in the same conversational group at rehearsals or concerts, or I yelled at him to grab one of the cookies I brought to practice, or I threw bottled water at him or Kyle because D Row seemed otherwise occupied.  But early in the season, I came to adopt a daily unofficial policy of not interacting with Jason unless he first came to me. 

I violated that in Ann Arbor:  Once to flag him down in the Big House when Michigan’s Drum Major was looking for him, and again that night on the trip back to Columbus, when I passed him on my way to talk to somebody else.  He seemed, as you might expect, less than thrilled with the outcome of the game.  So I paused to share some compliments about his performance that I’d overheard that day.  But other than that, conversation, especially of the type you have grown used to reading about in the off season, did not happen-- nor did I really expect it to.   He was sweet enough to catch up with me online a couple of times, and that always made me smile.

I did take Jason’s picture much more than I otherwise would have because his family was lovely about telling me that they greatly enjoyed seeing the shots I grabbed of him during rehearsals (and they, in turn, took pictures of me… taking pictures of the Band.)  I realized that these were the people who had been supporting him since he first picked up a baton, and that I was privileged to see him backstage and in “everyday” moments they were not.  So in that sense, I often took a second to be their eyes as he quickly reached the apogee of his DM career. 

It was also the history minor in me leaping to the fore; these moments would never pass this way again for Jason in this extraordinary position of his as the Ohio State Drum Major, and I think he was too busy living them to worry about creating any kind of permanent record.  What I fail to capture for him and the 2011 Band in words, I hope that I have done so in some small way pictorially.

D Row seemed to follow Jason’s lead regarding interaction and socializing.  We often spoke on the sidelines, under the stands during games, and backstage during concerts about all sorts of TBDBITL and  non-TBDBITL things, the content of which will remain off the record, but “after hours” we all went our separate ways—which, again, I expected.  They didn’t invite; I didn’t ask. 

As a matter of fact, I loosely took this approach with the rest of the Band as well, but very soon individual members and groups within rows began to reach out to me, both in person during practice and performance situations as well as online.  Due to the tight ties, I let the Band know I was there, then backed away and let the members come to me.  Some bandsmen ignored me… some smiled and waved across the practice field but came no closer…  and many, much more than I expected, opened their arms and welcomed me in.   I was thrilled and honored to spend time off the field with many of them. 

But it took a bit to reach this balance.  At first it was a situation which was…  okay, weird, and in ways that had absolutely nothing to do with “gathering information” or writing a book. 

I’m an outsider to the Band and completely understand that I shall forever remain so; the row traditions and tight-knit structure of the Band create a vacuum-sealed closeness specifically for the purpose of uniting it, and that’s one of the reasons why it’s so magnificently good.  I had a foot in both worlds.  But at the same time, I was experiencing emotional connections with many individual members and groups which far transcended what a reporter feels while “working on a story”—this prediliction of mine is one of the main reasons why I lasted about a nanosecond in actual journalism and blessedly swerved into literary nonfiction. 

To the Band (and this includes Jason), I am technically a “media person,” but one with great passion for her subject, a subject which happens to be other 225 human beings. And in order to write the kind of book I am going to write—about the emotional and personal impact of this organization—I needed to open myself up to those 225 human beings, plus alumni, all former cultural enemies... and directly in the wake of several significant personal losses.  That was tremendously scary; I knew it would pave a road for rejection, ridicule, and hurt, all of which did indeed come my way.  

But the payoff isn’t just the material for a book; it’s the changes it brought me… the healing, the gift of the incredible, inspiring people it has been my honor to meet.  The 2011 Ohio State University Marching Band has been the greatest, most beautiful surprise of not just my career, but my entire life.

However, the initial manner in which I went about reaching out to people, especially in the beginning, wasn’t always effective.  I dearly wish I had a do-over.  Initially I placed far too much emphasis on social media, since early on there were huge gaps between my trips to Columbus, and that was the only form of connection I had.  Often I was impatient and socially tone deaf and… well… me. I had to force myself out of my usual terror of talking to people in getting-to-know-you situations within a situation which was already emotionally charged.  (And then, as we all know, I brilliantly added alcohol to the mix. WINNING!)  It was a struggle in many ways, and not without tears.  But, again-- well worth it.

I had to learn to simultaneously maintain an open posture and distance.  Normally, if a person I have come to care about is on the brink of a major public performance with enormous emotional and career implications, I take care to provide some semblance of moral support.  It means a great deal when people cheer for me like that for me in my life, especially when occupying the same physical space for hours on end, day after day.  And much to my delight, many bandsmen reciprocated that kind of affection, so I concentrated my energy there.  But, as I mentioned in September, where at least Jason is concerned, my role in showing support was to stay out of his way.  Since I respected Jason’s position as Drum Major as well as him as a person, I tried to meet him (or, as the case may be, not meet him) on his terms. 

Again, I don’t know how well I did.  I’ve never been in this kind of relationship before, and neither, I imagine, has Jason.  But this is a person I would want get to know and spend time with even if neither one of us had ever heard of The Ohio State University Marching Band.  I hope he and many of the people I’ve met along the way will want to remain in one another’s lives long after this book is on the shelves, as has been the case with others I’ve worked with on similar projects.  Bottom line... I did what I could to honor Jason’s role and the wide swath of emotional territory surrounding it.

And so to answer your question: No, I do not know what the 2011 Drum Major thinks of Urban Meyer.

Reader Question of the Day

Q.  Hey MB, what do Our Jason and TBDBITL do now that football season is over, just hang out and wait for the bowl game? 

A.  They return to their land of origin, there to sharpen their batons, shine their horns, construct training montages, and brood upon the wounds of their enemies.  Upon the New Year they shall arise more powerful than you can possibly imagine.

Rhythm Nation

Previously on Blonde Champagne:  You're living in a parallel universe, BTW.  Just so you know.

It's low tide in Mobile Bay, and on the far side of the inlet there's cotton on the stalk.  Four seasons of rolling back and forth through the cornfields near where I grew up renders this an alien landscape.  I walked off the plane from Ohio to palm trees in the airport parking lot coated with Christmas lights.  It's not new to me... but it's not familiar, either.

Familiar territory, on the other hand, is where JI Row lives.  

Their territory is the concrete yards of the stadium ramp, the red dots marking the way and the slight cracks in the walls.  Seven Saturdays a year, they march down the ramp, along the dots, bend around the north goalpost, and mark time, beating a cadence for the rest of The Ohio State University Marching Band as it follows.  They have taken for themselves the slogan "First On the Grass," and their entrance into the stadium is the opening rite of the pregame ritual, the very first sign the crowd has that this game Has Begun. 

That is why Olivia, Warrior Princess was brooking no crap on the morning of the final home game, for JI Row is rightfully serious about this.   At the end of each rehearsal, while the other rows stand clustered in squad meetings or drift back to the Band Center to reclaim backpacks and instrument cases, JI is practicing the ramp entrance.  In the rain.  And the cold.  Twice.  And sometimes more.  For in Ohio Stadium, as the ramp entrance unfolds, the Drum Major takes his cue from a member of X Row; X Row takes its cue from the final placement of the other rows in the Band, and the other rows in the Band take their cue from JI.

And JI takes its cue from I Row squad leader Jacob Lowe.  During drill set rehearsals, as horns lay scattered in the sideline pellets of the practice field, Jacob's snare is still hung about his neck, tapping out the design for his bandmates to form.  The OSUMB is a mighty beast; JI Row is its beating heart; Jacob is the aorta.

One day the aorta called to me across the rehearsal hall.  "We get here an hour and a half before everybody else on game day.  If you'd like to come early on Saturday and see what we do," he said, "you can."

I think I nodded.  My instinctual reply was rather more girly-submissive and I had to remind myself not to flutter my hands about, or sink into a chair, for as we all know that's frowned upon in these parts.  But I had just been extended a tremendous honor, one which I hadn't even imagined might come my way.  Other authors dream of Pulitzer Prizes and PhD English chairs; I drove away from the Band Center that day crying into the steering wheel cover because 29 percussionists had invited me to break doughnuts with them.  For "JI keeps to themselves," I was warned multiple times.  "Don't even try to get to know them." 

If that's the case, the exclusivity is a right they've more than earned; of all the instruments feeding in from the top marching high schools in the nation, you are not going to have trouble fielding a bunch of drummers.  And fast hands and an internal clock aren't enough.  Dozens of top DCI candidates are turned away because they can't master TBDBITL's marching style.  There's a reason why, every year, when the Band plays pep songs for the football team and the invitation comes to grab an instrument and march along, these media guide cover boys run like small children for the snares and bass.  And then, when the players had dropped the sticks and scattered from the rec center and their fellow bandsmen were long for the parking lot, several members of JI row hoisted their instruments to practice marching.

In an organization hellbent on beating the living daylights out of mediocrity, JI arrives early and stays late.  It is their cadences which daily called me up the steps of the Band Center at 3:58 each afternoon as the rest of the Band assembled to kick off "Buckeye Battle Cry"; they are the ones who play on during parades when everyone else has laid down the mouthpiece.  It is bass drum players who I saw checking and adjusting one another's posture as they placed their mallets on their shoulders during the final rehearsal of the year.  Rookie Alex Calderone told me that he spent hours sitting on the floor prior to tryouts, swinging the mallet, just swinging and swinging it, to swish the move in precisely the correct manner. 

And it is the bass drum players who will purchase the extra screen time those enormous shiny "OHIO” drum heads tend to garner in knotted muscle and bloody strap burns.  After the rigorous cardiohell which is a full ramp entrance, bass drummers proceed to swing the drum against their upper chests during the playing of "Carmen Ohio"… and hold it there.  During penalty drills, I saw one member of J Row haul his instrument up and down the hash marks at the same speed and with the same squareness as D Row with their batons and A Row's cornets.  By the time he arrived at where I watched at the 40 yard line, he was screaming as he swung the bass about at each turn, but was still in step with his fellow bandsmen, and, I imagine, remained so.  I couldn't bear to watch him any more past the 35.

Snare players lay down their drums like firstborn children before the Drum Major just prior to ramp; their sticks are flashing silver and at least one member, Matt Barrett, gives them away to kids at the end of each game day.  I sat next to Matt as we rode the band bus from Columbus to Ann Arbor; at one point he left his seat and his sticks hit the floor during a sudden stop. I scooped them up and held them tightly together across my lap, the tip of one resting against the end of the other.  These were important.

On game day, JI Row gathers at the ramp before the rookies wheeling coolers, before the ushers, before the football team.  Sometimes Olivia wears her hair down, the crash of the cymbals blowing it away from her face, but on Saturdays, there's not a spare strand to be seen.

The morning I was permitted to join JI, I stood in the first tier of spectator seats and watched them align-- without directors, without Drum Major, without a soul to applaud them.

"Drums on the side," Jacob yelled, and down they went… halfway, because one person was out of step. So they went again. And again.  And again.  With each run, they stopped right at the goalpost, just before reaching the grass of the field.  That was for later.

Once Jacob and Olivia were satisfied that the steady beat of JI Row would anchor their bandmates once more, they stood together, hands on one another’s shoulders, and faced away from me, away from the field—up the ramp and out into the world. They murmured to one another; I backed away so that I could not hear.  You can’t miss the noise a drumline makes, but I had no right to listen to this.

It’s “drums on the side” just before you see them, but that’s not how JI lives.  When you’re first in the rehearsal room, first in the parking lot, and first on the field, you better have your instrument directly in the center of your sightline.  They march down the sides of the ramp, but the heartbeat... that always issues from the center of the body.