So my high school band is having a 50th year celebration and they want us all to go on the field for the Rider/Old High game and spell out Rider. I can bring an instrument if I want to. Of course I laugh at it all because it will be a cold day and they will have to kidnap me to get me up to Wichita Falls. It does bring memories of my trumpet playing career. I was pretty good in junior high until that inevitable day when I got braces. I was a first chair, meaning the best. Then the next day I got challenged and went down to third chair, never to regain my title again. As I look back now I can see the braces and retainer did absolutely nothing. It's not like my teeth were crooked. I'd only get Brennon braces if he had buck teeth or something.

Anyways, so I continued playing trumpet into high school. The best thing about being in band was the road trips to Dallas. Going to the malls and enjoying the games without having to pay to get in. The worst thing was the marching and the early start. As I look back I can't believe I was on the field at 7AM most days. I think I had alot more energy back then. Some people would say the band girls were fun to hang out with. But me, being a nerd, could never hang out with most of them because I was shy. I wonder what could have been. Eh, there was a purpose for it all. I probably would have made more mistakes had I had better self esteem.

I liked playing trumpet though and I knew that if I continued on I could have been good. My obsessions though turned to computers. I remember the best moment playing trumpet I ever had and it was spiritual. I had been talking with my brother about God before I went to the football game. I told him I thought that I didn't like it when people turned to God when they were in trouble and that if I was God I would like it better when people turned to me when their life was good. I remember telling him that I thought his way of religion was too social with God and He needed more sacred reverence. That was my presbytrian/episcopalian upbringing. So I decided on the field that I would play the trumpet giving God my sacred reverence in the theme song for 2001. As the notes came out I realized that I wasn't playing anymore and it was the Spirit in me that was playing trumpet. The trumpet was blaring louder than anyone on the feild. People started looking at me. Apparently the Spirit went into the stands. The band teacher could hear the difference at the top of the stands. Later I could tell he analyzed the tape to find out who was playing that. I suppose when he saw me swing the trumpet around at the end and scream "yeah" he knew it was me. It was a special moment. It was then when I knew that a spiritual life gives a person tremendous passion and power. How's your spiritual life?