Day 15 ~ Your Statement to the World About Marching

Marching band is a hell of a lot more than you think. It's not just walking around on a field or street playing music and twirling stuff. It takes discipline. A LOT of discipline. There's a proper way to march, and even "walking around" gives you a workout. And I think I ran more miles in two weeks of band camp than I did my whole freshman year of PE. And they say it's not a sport? Hell of a lot more sport in it than golf. (That's something from my Kaiser doctor, not me. =P) Then there's the whole air-preservation thing (I'd assume) that the band has to deal with, and spinning a 4-5 lb block of wood and tossing it in the air gets pretty tiring after a while...

Marching backwards and stuff takes skill too. And especially when the band and guard pass through each other? Or even just the guard? Have to trust whoever's going forward to not have their eyes on the rifle triple they're tossing so they don't run into you.

It's more than it seems. You have to actually be a band geek or a guardie to know what it takes.