Okay, so this is the LAST year we're doing Marching Band. I floored at what happened to me last week:

We had our county fair band competition last week. I've done about a half dozen county fair competitions and this is how it ALWAYS goes: Get there around noon, practice, go to the competition, wait for the judging, go to the fair, ride rides, eat dinner and meet back at the bus around 5pm to practice and for the kids to horse around for two hours and get ready for the parade later on at 7pm. Every single time. This is what happened this week: We didn't ride with the bus because my son had the county fair spelling bee earlier, so we arrived back at the fair (after eating at Burger King) about ten minutes after the bus and the band arrived. Apparently, there was an important announcement during this ten minutes that I didn't hear, that you'll hear in a minute.

So, we have the competition (finishing dead last), watch the judging, get our food vouchers for dinner and take off for the fair with my two kids and my DD's best friend. At about ten minutes to five, we decide to get some dinner and carry it back to the bus, but my daughter had one of her migraines and had to sit down for a bit while my son and her best friend ate dinner and we got back to the bus at 5:30. Well, the bus and the entire band were GONE! Vanished, nowhere to be found. My daughter's best friend's purse and cell phone were on the bus, my daughter's clarinet and uniform were on the bus. Apparently, during that ten minute window of time earlier, they announced that the band was not doing the parade and the bus was leaving at 5pm! Not ONE person told me that the bus was leaving FOUR HOURS EARLY. I was there for hours and talked to the band director repeatedly about different things and she knew I arrived a little late as when we got there, my son showed her his trophy from the spelling bee (3rd place!!) and you would have thought that she would have had the presence of mind to say, "Hey, you missed an announcement that we're not doing the parade today and we're leaving at 5."

Thing that's getting me so miffed is that my next door neighbor is giving me the gist that I'm the one at fault for not getting the best friend to the bus in time and that "If I'm not going to be where the announcements are being made, then I have find out what's going on if I'm going to take off with a student." I was so P freaking O'd I wanted to slap her across the face. I spend my own money on cases of water for the band and follow them around with my radio flyer wagon and cooler and make sure the band is hydrated during parades, I coach the flag twirlers (when we can get some participants) and I just can't believe they are making me feel like I did something wrong or acted irresponsibly when it would have never occurred to me that the bus was leaving at that time without someone telling me that.

Thing is also that its all a clicky thing. I'm not part of the 'in' crowd around town and the band director is and she doesn't like talking to me and when she does, you can tell she's doing so under durress as if she thinks she's going to mar her reputation by being seen talking to me and this is the result of that - her not giving me key information about the day. Bottom line is that the bus LEFT AN EVENT WITHOUT A STUDENT...without even attempting to look for her! I'm not her legal guardian (although she was in the Girl Scout troop for many years and I know her mother well). We were just inside the fair entrance waiting for the best friend's chicken wings and with my DD sitting out of the sun waiting for her Motrin to kick in. If they'd taken five minutes to look for her, they'd have found her immediately. But they decided to just leave without her and in that alone, I think they're morons. What school teacher just leaves without a student without first checking with the parent that it's okay for her to stay with me or even checking with me that I'm okay with taking her home?

Anyhow...I'm mostly miffed that the whole thing is turning out to be MY fault and it's totally bumming me out. I'm one of the parents that is truly involved in marching band...everyone else just drops them off, but somehow they get the memos and I don't.

So the county fair to the next county over is next month and I'm just wondering if we should even participate. My son carries the banner for the band and my daughter and her best friend are the only clairnetists in the band and if we all didn't show, they'd be in a really bad spot. The in me is thinking I'd like to do that to them, but the realistic person in me is saying that I'm a bigger person than that and should just show up. On the other hand, I also have to close up my shop for the day and lose about $100 in sales, plus the gas to get there (about an hour and a half away). Having my kids take the bus there is out of the question seeing as how easily they'll just leave a kid behind if they aren't at the check in point on time. So, I'm just wondering if I should bother with the next county fair of bag it. The bigger person in me is saying, "Just do it." But this is absolutely the LAST year we're going marching band. Maybe the teacher can get one of her friends from the "in" crowd to bring water and follow the band around...

OK ~ TECH I have been around situations like this forever, being involved with sports from the time my kids were t-ballers through college.

FIRST ~ DO THE NEXT FAIR!!

SECOND ~DO NOT FAIL TO DO THE NEXT FAIR

THIRD ~SEND YOUR KID ON THAT BUS!!

With the trouble your kids have been having lately, I feel the worst thing to do would be to remove them from the things that they do have friends in.

Not IN ANY WAY placing blame here, but it seems like the parade is/was a big deal. I find it odd that the decision would be made at the last minute w/o any parents knowing about it...to take away 4 hours from something "normally" done seems odd. As far as not getting the memos...

I hate to say it...but as coaches we rely a lot on the kids...older ones...to give their parents the memos...NOT PLACING BLAME...could your daughter maybe have those?

My nephew missed A lot of info in school....the other kids had it! But NO ONE told him....hummm...I think they did

FOURTH ~ You are there for your KID...not the other parents or band directors, etc. Be pleasant and cordial so as not to stir it up...as I might do

FIFTH ~ have one

SIXTH ~ I WOULD TOTALLY COMPLAIN ABOUT LEAVING THE KIDS BEHIND!that would never happen in our groups! I remember one year we had over 100 cross country kids in Las Vegas ~ kids got to wander in the casino for an hour...kids part...parents walking through at all times...2 kids snuck out...then got lost IN THE CASINO...we waited for 2 hours mid-night to 2am looking for them...high school kids....made for a though 5am wake up and race call!

SEVENTH ~ Take a breath...don't allow this incident...I know it isn't a small one...but don't allow it to keep your kids from future fun.

PRAYERS!

I have to agree with EZ that it would probably be best to keep the kids in the program. Yes, leaving a kid behind is completely unforgivable (and really surprising), but as far as the band director getting the message to you, I have to say I can see how something like that could happen. My husband and I coach cross country together, and a cross country meet is FAR less stressful than a band competition (from what I remember from being in band in high school) and there's a LOT less going on, but we still forgot things. It's VERY difficult when you're in a coaching or sponsoring position to make sure every person knows every little thing. It's tough to understand unless you've been in that position. Yes, there's a chance this person is horribly petty and decided she simply did not WANT to tell you what you needed to know, but chances are that it slipped her mind because she had nine billion other things to think about. In my experience as a teacher and coach, it seems that quite frequently parents tend to forget that we have dozens of parents and kids to deal with and they're mostly just thinking of their own child (as they should). You kind of have to look at it from the perspective of the teacher/coach/director sometimes. I hope I can remember that when my little one gets to the age to participate in things.

Regardless of whether the director is petty and awful or not, however, taking your kids out of a program like marching band is only punishing them. The director will deal with their absence one way or another -- but the kids are the ones who would benefit by staying with it. I know it's hard not to take things personally, but teachers/coaches/directors honestly don't have the time to think of ways to make parents unhappy. I've had a parent tell me that her son believed I was singling him out for punishment, and my response was simply this: Do you really think a teacher has time to bother with that? It sounds kind of blunt, but I can't begin to tell you how true it is. She could only see her son's side of it (obviously he would come up with any way to show how things weren't HIS fault, and she believed him), but I really can't imagine a teacher having the extra time to even be that petty. Maybe I'm naive and other teachers are sitting around twirling their mustaches and doing evil things.

Sorry to ramble so much! I hope you will let your kids continue in the program, and maybe you can just have a talk with the director about what happened.

Thing is, is that I'm being left out of the loop on many other things, as well. Such as, Shelley missed practice on Friday because practice is 20 miles away (we have a huge school district - real estate wise) at the other elementary school and I had to open my shop early and with Shelley's clarinet getting taken away on the bus that left early, I didn't want to waste the gas getting her there for the 45 minutes I would have been able to have her there without even her clarinet in hand. So, the next practice (Saturday) was at the school in my neighborhood, so I got her up early to get her to practice and there was an empty parking lot. Practice had been cancelled, but nobody bothered to tell us because, well, Shelley wasn't at practice on Friday and so I guess they decided to stick it to us and say, "Well, if you're not there when the announcements are made..." Which is exactly what my next door neighbor said to me. You know, we aren't lazy people that blow things off...if we aren't there, there is a reason for it. We also needed to square away her uniform because hers was on the bus that left early and I had hoped to get it figured out on Saturday's practice. There was supposed to be a parade on Sunday and we needed to get her uniform, but it was rained out.

My next door neighbor, by the way, has the band leader as a guitar teacher and piano teacher for all of her kids AND her father.

I'm just so fed up with everything and feeling like a forgotten person, even though I have two kids in the band. I just don't know how everyone seems to know what's going on except me. Its just so aggrevating. Especially with the price of gas, how far I have to travel to get around and how much money I lose at my shop when I have to shut down to go to these events.

Regarding letting my kids go alone on the bus. No way! Not when they're so easy to leave someone behind and not with my seven year old! My daughter won't go anywhere unless I'm with her or she has a panic attack and I'm glad I was there on Tuesday when she got a headache and I had her Motrin.

Am I saying that the band leader is taking time to figure out ways that she can make my life miserable? NO. I live in a TINY town that totally glorifies all who have certain last names, or those that went to school here themselves or those that have big gigantic houses on the river. I am none of these things and so, therefore, I go uncounted and forgotten. I'm just so sick of it. Literally, I have had some people come into my shop for a haircut that have told me they have been trying to get so-and-so in for a haircut, but they don't know who I'm related to, so they won't come to me. For crying out loud!! Its just a friggen haircut...I'm not asking to be married into the family and taint the gene pool!

I have a best friend in town that is from Maryland and she and I feel the same emotions about this all the time, so I just got back from her house and we B'd and moaned about the town for a couple of hours and now I do feel much better. Nothing like a good rant. But I'm still peeved about them leaving Shelley's friend behind without so much as looking for her and then making me feel like I'm the one at fault because my subliminal messaging was out of order adn I didn't get the message that the bus was leaving four hours early. Which, by the way, the reason it was cancelled for us was because two girls (the only trumpet players in the band) couldn't make the parade because they had a softball game. So, they cancelled it and announced it when they got to the fair, about ten minutes before I got there. Which, the reason we didn't take the bus there was because we were already there for the spelling bee earlier in the day. And, besides, on the instructions to get there (times/places, etc.) it says if you are to get there by yourself, be there at this time, so its not necessary to ride the bus.

Would they normally call each person who wasn't at the previous practice to let them know that the next practice was cancelled? I'm just asking because that is NOT something my husband and I ever had time to do when kids missed practices for cross country, and now I'm thinking I've probably pissed parents off too!

I don't mean to sound like I don't understand where you're coming from. I do. And clearly there are other things going on with that freaky little clique-y town you live in. Whatever happens, I hope your kids get to continue with the program if they truly enjoy it and are learning from it.

Suggest that the band get a website (it can be for free) where all postings are posted so everyone can check in to see if there are any changes. My DD's band (granted it was HS) did this and the rule was "check the website daily" to check for updates on the schedule. In the 4 years she was in the HS band, only once did she not get an update only because the update was posted while she was enroute to the performance. It wasn't a big deal--she simply didn't have one item of clothing that she needed and they had a few extras.

You can check out her band's website--www.psband.org (and since it is a .org it is free. All it takes is the time for someone to design something and someone to update it as needed).