When I look back at my high school career, the one single thing that sticks out to me the most is marching band, specifically color guard. I was a member of the color guard and the marching band all four years of high school, and became color guard captain and a marching band captain in my senior year. This meant attending leadership meetings, scheduling practices, running drills, and choreographing routines. It was no doubt my favorite thing about high school, not only because it was so much fun and incredibly rewarding, but also because of the life lessons I learned from marching band. Here are the most important ones.

1. Punctuality

Don't be this guy.

If there’s one single thing I learned from marching band, it’s the importance of being on time. Our band director (shout out to you, Mr. Pandolfe) instilled in us all that "to be early is to be on time, and to be on time is to be late..." And you don’t want to be late. It’s almost as bad as not showing up at all. That’s when you’re really in trouble.

Marching band trained me to arrive to practice at least 20 minutes early to prepare, including unlocking the color guard closet and getting out all our necessary equipment before the other girls started to arrive to warm up. I also learned to get up to the football field early to warm up before the rest of the band arrived.

2. Discipline

During practice, you do the same drill so many times (in the dead heat) that you want to fall flat on the burning turf. But you keep doing it, and doing it, and doing it again and again until everybody gets it right and the drill is perfect. We learned (the hard way) that practice makes permanence. The drills, combined with the band’s music, ignited muscle memory. Soon enough, we had the drills down pat. There comes a time in the marching band season where you can do the halftime show in your sleep. There also comes a time where you are cursing whoever invented the chop step (“KNEES TO CHEST PEOPLE, KNEES TO CHEST!”)

3. Band camp is no laughing matter.

Anyone who has participated in marching band knows they can never talk about band camp with someone who never did marching band, because always comes the: “one time, at band camp” joke. Stop saying it. It’s not funny. It was never funny. Seriously.

Band camp is the most strenuous and stressful part of being in marching band. It is definitely not a laughing matter. What happens at band camp stays at band camp, and what happens at band camp is a ton of hard work, usually eight to ten hours a day, mostly outside, in the summertime. But we have a lot of fun too. Whether it’s march offs to test everyone’s marching skills and how well new band members have memorized drills (“TEN-HUT, FORWARD MARCH”), to inducting freshmen into marching band in weird, nighttime ceremonies, band camp is where some of the most and best memories from the entire marching band experience are made. Although your body may hate you during these difficult weeks, the hard work most definitely pays off. Band camp is serious business. Shout out to "American Pie" for ruining its reputation forever.

4. "It ain't over till it's over."

It doesn’t matter if practice ends at 9 pm. If 9 pm comes and the drill isn’t perfect, your band director is going to keep drilling you until it is. It doesn’t matter if it’s 9:30 and the drill still isn’t perfect. You can leave when it’s done, and it’s done right. Any realm of time does not exist during marching band practice. You would know this because you aren’t allowed to have your cell phone with you on the field… or else. So, unless you remember to wear a watch, only then are you aware of the time. Your band director on the other hand, pays no mind. It doesn’t matter what time it is. Keep doing it until it’s perfect. Then, and only then, are you dismissed.

The same goes for competition days. Even if the schedule says you will arrive back to the high school at 10 pm, it will probably be more like 11. And that’s before you unload the buses, put all the equipment away, and change out of uniform. Only then may you go.

5. The show must go on!

Marching band taught me how to work effectively under pressure, whether it be time constraints (having to choreograph color guard routines to four songs in two weeks), absent members (having to adjust the entire show to avoid “holes” in the overall formation due to absent color guard members), or the sudden onset of bad weather, which leads to problems with equipment and the possibility of postponement or cancellation of performances and competitions, marching band brought on a lot of pressure all at once. Despite the obstacles that come up throughout the marching band season, we had to work through it. Marching band truly teaches that no matter what, the show must go on!

6. The true meaning of teamwork.

We're all in this together.

I’ve always preferred to work alone, in and outside of the classroom. I absolutely despised group work in my classes in high school. But in marching band, working in a group takes on a whole new meaning. My high school marching band consisted of more than 100 students, and it took a lot of work to coordinate all of us to move in sync, at the right pace, at the right intervals, and in the right spots on the field. My color guard squad consisted of 15-20 members, and some times were harder than others when it came to coordinating everyone to twirl the right moves at the right time, especially when on opposite sides of the football field, and often unable to see each other.

Marching band requires team synchronization, which isn't easy. And that's before we add in the music and the color guard twirls. Being a part of marching band taught me how to be an effective member of a project and a community so much larger than myself. I learned how to move together in sync with over 100 other students. It was the ultimate team that required incredible teamwork. Just look at that form!

7. How to let loose.

When it’s show time, you have to let loose. As soon as you step onto the field for halftime, as soon as that whistle blows, you become a different person. Similar to any actor on a stage, you enter performance mode. And with this, sometimes comes a bit of stage fright!

Especially when your marching band has a small dance break in the middle of a song, like my marching band did, you really have to be able to let loose and put on a good show. Performing on a field means having to exaggerate your movements, and although I can’t dance AT ALL, dancing in sync with the entire marching band was the most fun part of any halftime performance. Show time is the time when all your hard work pays off, and you get to have some fun with the drills that have been drilled (ha, ha) into your brain. As someone who is usually reserved, I learned how to really let loose and just have fun with it.

8. To put a smile on my face no matter what.

Behind the halftime show is a lot of sweat and hard work. But when it’s show time, the field is our stage. And we have a show to put on. No matter how hot or tired we are from rehearsing, the adrenaline begins coursing through your body, and you put on the biggest smile- bigger than you thought you were capable of! At first, you may have to fake a smile due to nerves (the crowd is a lot bigger than I thought it was…) but then the show starts and the fun begins! We’ve practiced the show so many times that we don’t have to worry about forgetting what to do and when and where, so this is the time where we have the most fun. The thrill of performing and competing never wore off, even after four years, I still got the same excitement I did the first time I ever performed on the field.

Marching band taught me that if we’re not having fun with the show, the audience isn’t going to have fun- especially not the judges at competitions! So although the process behind building the halftime show requires a lot of discipline and painfully exact accuracy, show time means big smiles and having a blast proving what a great show we have made!

Marching band and color guard have become lifelong passions of mine, and seeing any marching band performance makes my heart swell with joy, as I'm sure my fellow "band geeks" out there have experienced themselves. Once you're in marching band, you're never really out. A piece of your heart stays with every band you ever see perform, but your heart truly belongs with your own marching band, which you will cherish forever.