I wrote most of this a year ago and never finished. Since then I’ve survived 2 (or 3) more of these events, including the holiday concert just last week. I consider myself a professional band parent by now.

Yes, it’s true. I survived my first middle school band concert. As a parent, that is. I survived several on my own as a student and nowhere near accomplished clarinet player. On that note, I’d like to give a shout out to my mom, who spent countless hours at these events, driving me to private lessons, and listening to me practice in my bedroom. I don’t know how she did it, but she certainly showed me that moms will do almost anything for their kids.

As the day grew near for the SMS Holiday Concert, I felt anxiety and uncertainty. I was anxious for my son (who clearly wasn’t himself), and uncertain of whether I could make it through the entire 90 minute ‘show’. I have an attention span of about 8 minutes, and issues with being in large chaotic groups of parents and students. This challenge before me felt daunting to say the least.

The morning of the concert, I wrote BAND CONCERT on our kitchen chalkboard, because, by this point, I had subconciously forgot about the event, I’m sure as a means to protect myself from more anxiety. It was not unlikely that, without a reminder, I would completely forget to drive him there and realize it half way through another episode of “Good Luck Charlie” on Disney channel. We did drop him off on schedule, and even had time for my husband and I to pick up lattes as our replacement dinner.

Flash forward. After navigating our way to the gym (following other people), arriving in chaos (see above), and chatting with a few other parents, we found open seats in the last row of the ‘floor seating’. This left for a view of nothing but ski caps, climbing children, and other random adult heads. Of course, if we’d been in the front row, we would have only seen music stands, as every kid hid behind theirs. A couple of times I caught a glimpse of my son in between a bald guy and a teenage kid who was obviously serving out some sort of punishment by being there.

We chatted with our friends in front and to the side of us. All making the same cliche comments about ‘why does this have to be 90 minutes’, and ‘can we get this show on the road already?’. We were all clearly sharing the same lack of patience and desire to be home having a glass of wine rather than sitting in plastic stacking chairs.

At some point, probably 8 minutes in to the show, I moved quickly into my ‘I’ve lost interest’ mode, so I started visually scanning the room to find something else to have my attention. Here’s what I saw: A grown man playing Angry Birds on his iPad. More than one adult sleeping. Several kids on handheld games and reading. A mom reading a book on her phone. LOTS of parents reading whatever on their phones. And a kid sitting on the floor drawing.

With not much left to look at, I moved into ‘space out’ mode, otherwise known as, ‘deep thoughts’. Here’s what went through my head, “why is that guy wearing sweatpants to a music concert? I wish I was in sweatpants. I wish I was at home on the couch and this latte was a hamburger. I really need to take action on my snack cart idea. I think selling food at school events would be genius. What time is it? The clock is like 7 hours off. Why don’t they use the stage? Could this seat be more uncomfortable? These events truly are one big germfest. I’m taking Airborne the SECOND I get home. ‘ “What? Oh!” (clap clap clap clap clap clap clap)

The clapping woke me from my ADD coma long enough to watch and listen to the band play. I’m sure I heard my son rocking it on the flute, never missing a note. Or maybe I just imagined it. After they finished, I continued my cycle of spacing out until, finally, it was time to go home. I was pleasantly surprised to have made it through, and had less anxiety about the next one in the spring.

Oh, middle school band concert, how I loathe the. Please be kind the next time around.