Marching Band. Yeah. Marching Band.

My husband Wesley and I were both in marching band in high school; he played the trumpet, and I was on drumline. For us, band was the only thing that existed. Okay, maybe not the only thing, but certainly the main thing. Probably the first thought that pops into your head as you read this is, "This one time, at band camp..." We are all accutely aware of the stereotypes that go along with being in band. Enough, I get it, we're dorks. Got the memo.

What people don't realize sometimes is that band, to the people that are in it, is kind of like a fraternity. You see your bandmates more than your friends or family, and you tend to gravitate toward making most of your friends in band because, frankly, that's the only way you'll have time to have friends at all. It should also be noted that there is intense emotional bonding in marching band. Although many people view the band as a not-so-noteworthy accessory to the football team, there actually is a huge subculture in which people make large sums of money writing music, show concepts, drill (where you march on the field), and the like. Contests are taken very seriously; the intensity of the competitive environment surrounding marching band might be surprising to an outsider.

Why is it such a big deal? Because when you spend five to eight exhausting hours a day developing your talent, with the same group of people, working toward the same goal, you become emotionally invested. It can't be helped - the rehearsal schedule and demands tend to force out the ones who really don't want to be there.

Many people in America love to watch Sunday football. Or is it Saturday football? Wait, wasn't there a Monday night football at one point? I don't know; the point is, I don't get all you sports fans. I don't find watching sports any more entertaining than I would find watching people work out in a gym. It's really hard for me to understand and empathize with people who are genuinely upset over "their" team's loss; I'm not trying to say that their feelings are invalid, I just truly cannot relate (probably the same way most of you would not be able to grasp why someone would pay ten dollars to watch a marching band contest).

This makes me the odd person out most of the time - especially at work, where every single one of my colleagues is a football fanatic. In fact, I have one co-worker who actually buys a new outfit in her team's colors every week in honor of the game - whether she is physically at the game or watching it at home! To be fair, it is the team where she went to college, but come on... really?

August through December are usually very lonely months for me at work because I can't really participate in sports discussions. Occasionally, someone will pop over and ask if I'm going to watch the game this weekend, to which I usually respond, "No. In fact, I don't think it would be physically possible for me to care about football or any sport less than I do at this very moment." Am I taking crazy pills here? Surely I'm not the only one in America who feels this way. I'm sure my attitude about the whole thing is quite offputting, but LBH (let's be honest) - would any of you want to stand around and talk about the drum break before the closing number or so-and-so's new uniforms? Probably not.

Perhaps my aversion to football and sports as a whole is based on how athletically deficient I've always been; I wanted to play sports as a child, but not only did I not (and still do not) understand all of the rules for how the games are played, I felt extremely awkward running or doing any physical activity in front of other people (PE was a nightmare).

This may be why I always gravitated more toward the arts - music in particular. You sports people have football season, we band dorks have marching season. You watch games, we watch shows. You have fantasy football, we have... well, there isn't such a thing as fantasy band, but you get the idea.

Going to marching band contests is quite nostalgic for Wesley and me; we met through band when we were juniors in high school. For us and most other former marching band/drum corps participants, keeping up with our favorite schools' bands keeps us connected with something that helped shape us into who we are. It's not just the performance aspect, it's also the lasting friendships we found, the senses of humor we cultivated, the leadership skills we developed, and the culture and community bonds we created.

Basically, if loving marching band is wrong, then I just don't want to be right.

Is That Really a Thing?!

Death by Caffeine

Like most Americans, I'm not really what you would call a "morning person." I get up early every day, and every day I think the same thing: "No. Please, just... no." For most of us, coffee (or caffeine in some form) is a way to at least appear to be alive and functioning in our roles as productive members of society. Consumption of caffeine ranges from the occasional coffee drinker to the four-pots-a-day caffaholic. I think I'm probably somewhere in the middle. I wouldn't say that I'm a "Do not even look at me until I have had my coffee!" person, but I've definitely reached the level of, "Things might go a lot more smoothly if we have this meeting after my first cup of Joe."

Perhaps I live under a rock with my coffee maker and arsenal of diet soda, because I only found out this morning that caffeine can cause intoxication, psychiatric disorders, and actually kill you. Yes, that's right... KILL YOU. When I read about caffeine-induced organic mental disorder on drowning.com, I thought it was a joke. But as I read and realized that they weren't kidding, I thought, "Wait... Is that really a thing?!"

Trying to corroborate the validity of the suggestion that caffeine is treacherous, I did what any normal person does: I Google'd. It turns out that there are countless websites, blogs, articles, and the like that explain the risks associated with caffeine use. There are actually diagnoses for caffeine-related intoxication, anxiety, sleep disorder, and many more. And, if a person drinks more than his or her body can handle, the person can have a fatal caffeine overdose. There are actually documented cases of deaths that happened this way!

I don't mean to sound insensitive or disrespectful, but I have to wonder... Weren't there any signs before it reached that point that maybe you had one too many double-espresso lattes? I know that for me, drinking even half of one popular energy drink (whose ads boast of making people fly) sends me into a jittery tailspin of fidgeting and using too many words in my sentences. I interpret that reaction as a sign that I shouldn't have anymore caffeine for awhile. Am I just taking crazy pills here, or don't most people have small-scale reactions like this before it reaches truly damaging heights?

The blame for most caffeine-induced hysteria is aimed at energy drinks. One article on Inventor Spot even states that some energy drinks contain the same amount of caffeine as fourteen cans of cola. I don't think that is necessarily brand new information to most people; the fact that it's called an "energy drink" pretty much indicates its purpose. Moreover, if you are drinking something that has a name sounding anything like, "Extreme Hard-Core Brain Damage Energy Fun," "You Really Can't Handle This, You Big Pansy," or "If You Ever Need to Run 57 Miles, This Is the Drink for You," that's probably a good indicator that there's some type of stimulant in it and you might want to, I don't know, monitor how much you're drinking?

Granted, I have to make the statement that in some cases, a person's caffeine threshold may be unusually low or perhaps the caffeine interacts with some other existing condition to cause caffeine-related disorders. I know there are outliers. But, for the rest of us, can we please just watch it a little, please? If people abuse caffeine, sooner or later it will be illegal to drive with an open container of coffee; and if you think caffeine-induced anxiety is a big deal, just wait until you see the effects of caffeine deprivation-induced road rage.