The news that our school was to have a band was announced during a 5th-6th grade assembly.  Assemblies were exciting news in and of themselves.  Who knew what could happen at an assembly?  Maybe the hoped for petting zoo and circus wouldn’t materialize after all, but no matter, because we welcomed any opportunity to break up the monotony of class.

The principal of the school strode out to the middle of the school gym, center stage, and announced that our school had been awarded funds for music education.  We were going to have a BAND, for 5th and 6th graders only!  The instruments were paraded around and demonstrated, and after, we all jostled each other around to get to the sign up sheet like we were signing up to see Willy Wonka’s Chocolate Factory.  We were that excited.  We were absolutely rabid to have a chance to play an instrument.

On the bus ride home that afternoon, all the kids were chattering about what instrument they wanted to play.  None louder than Snotty Dotty.

Snotty Dotty was my neighbor.  She was a “late” child.  All of her sisters were much older.  Teenagers approaching full on womanhood, and they were like aliens to me, frightening and wild and dangerous seeming.  They had boyfriends, and rode around in cars, and got to boss us around if they felt like it.  They knew things that they didn’t tell us, but they always had that look on their face when they watched us.

I didn’t like Dotty, but I was forced to go to her house after school every day until my parents got home.  She was a Momma’s girl, and all she ever wanted to do was play House with plastic baby dolls, and try and boss me around because her mom looked after me, and because her older sisters were always ready to threaten anyone that didn’t do exactly as their baby sister liked.  I didn’t get much opportunity to say no to Dotty.

On the bus, she was twisted around in her seat asking all the kids what instrument they were going to play.  The girls were all going for the clarinet and the flute, and the boys were all about the drums and the tubas.  I shoved my face up against the window, thinking about the flute.  Imagining the delicate shiny silver cylinder with its series of openings and keys, and the complex array of finger positions I would have to learn to make it sing.

I felt Dotty turn in her seat toward me, then she poked me in the shoulder.

“What are you gonna play?”

I looked at her pasty face eyeballing me, as the chatter went on behind her.

“The trombone”, I said, defiantly.

“What?  You can’t play the trombone.  That’s for boys stupid.”

“Well, that’s what I’m playing.  You’ll see.”

Dotty turned back to the bobbing rows of children, and scornfully announced what I had just said.  I heard the laughter erupt, and I shoved my cheek back up against the cool window.

You’ll see, I thought.

With love,