First post of the new year

It has been a couple of days since the band got back from the Atlanta Superdome for the Chick-Fil-Et bowl. It was quite a bit of fun and all of the band students seemed to really enjoy themselves. I am really happy that, in the last three years, we are able to involve almost all of the upper school students in our trips. We started the trip last Monday morning at about 7 AM and had a moderately pleasant trip to Atlanta. Once we got to Atlanta, our bus driver made a small mistake of plugging in Peachtree Avenue in our GPS instead of Peachtree Strett. If you know anything about Atlanta, you know that every street in the city has Peach in it, so it put us just a little bit behind. We had a good dinner at Hardrock cafe, checked into our nice hotel (The Mariott right by the airport), then headed out to watch a 10:50 showing of Avatar in 3D. It was about two in the morning when we got back, but all kids were still in good spirits the next morning.

The next day consisted of visiting the Georgia Aquarium, The CNN Center (with the tour, of course!), the World of Coke, then closed the day with a fun time of bowling and video games at Dave and Buster's. It was pretty neat. Wednesday consisted of a long mass band rehearsal with the retired director of bands from Illinois, Gary Smith. Following that, lunch at the Discover Mills mall, then back to the hotel to prepare for a fun night of food and dancing at The International Convention Center. Again, quite a bit of fun.

The last day of these bowl games are always tedious for the students, so its important to keep things as upbeat as possible. The kids handled it well, and seemed to enjoy the performance on the field. It was Michael Jackson themed, and was really great arrangements that the Illinois band has done before. It sounded awesome. ESPN being the wonderful network that it is, chose not to show any of the performance for the parents, so a DVD will be ordered for all of the parents to check out. The trip back was fun, and it was neat to watch the kids rock in the New Year with a little bit of Jamaican music. :)

Over the past three years, I have come to truly love all my students at PA. They are a good bunch, and I guess I perhaps live a little bit through them, so it is easy to forget myself in all that they go through. I left my bag which had my keys and some other items in it at the dome, mostly because I was so concerned about missing something with the band in their transitions to different locations and such. I tried my hardest not to act too upset around the kids, but I am sure they all picked up on my disorientation. Being around them and celebrating the new years with them all really helped pick up my spirits towards the end of the evening, however.

Well, we are back now, and I have spent the weekend relaxing and preparing for the first week back at work tomorrow morning. My panic attacks have really settled down since November, with only one attack since this time, I am starting to learn how to handle myself whenever I feel this illness starts to set in.

Personally, 2009 was a rough year with many challenges along the way. When you are the kind of person who I am, who keeps things mostly to themselves, is very introverted, and lives mostly alone, these problems can be magnified many times over. There are so many people who have extended arms to me this year and kept me sane. I appreciate and love you all. I definitely do not deserve the opportunities that are thrown my way.

Here is hoping that you have a happy new year! Lets work together to improve our world.