A little competition never hurt anyone

I think we all grew up in days gone by when competition was competition. You know those days where that if you won, you won and you lost, you lost. There was no celebration for just participating. Sure you may have gotten a trophy or certificate or something for showing up, but that bad taste was in your mouth for not being good enough. These days everyone is so scared to hurt someone's feeling or crush their spirits or whatever.

Well, today I get to see some good old high school competition. No, its not athletic, but rather marching band. I'm sure some of you are looking at me like "WTF?!? Band isn't competition!" Well, for those of you that may be saying that, I challenge to look at some marching videos on YouTube or somewhere. Some of the stuff these kids do is nothing short of spectacular. Of course, at the same time, there are those that just show up...the equivalent of the Detroit Lions, if you will.

My fellow blogger, Lin, knows what I'm talking about with these band contests as her two kids are currently in band up where she lives and just recently she nearly froze her butt off in support of them at their contest. I initially thought I wasn't going to be doing that, since they had forecast it to be 80 degrees today, but a cold front came through Thursday night and temperatures dropped like a rock. It is forecast to be around 60 today. Still way warmer than where she was, but hey, this is Louisiana, its not gonna be in the negatives, especially in October...lol

As I was saying, these kids go out there and put on the performance of their lives, then get out of their uniforms, go back and watch the other bands and wait for the awards ceremony to see what score they earned. Those that do well are ecstatic after they win their trophies, while those that come away empty handed hang their heads in shame and head home with just a participation trophy and the judges sheets/tapes.

while there may not be any head on head competition...at least at the one my students are competing in today (there are those that rank the bands that perform, so you're in competition with everyone, regardless of size...that's topic for another day), it is still something to relish because kids are competing and not being babied.

So, as I sit here checking my e-mail and blogs (and waiting for the little woman to get dressed) before I need to get over to the school, I wonder what kind of performance the kids are going to put on this afternoon. I'm sure they'll do just fine, but it would be totally awesome to bring back one of those Grand Champion trophies (and laugh in the face of the man I student taught under who has won the thing 27 yrs in row!!!) Yeah, that's a big goal, but hey, it's not impossible! I have a competitive spirit, what can I say?