Michigan Winter

Go Blue! Michigan finally won a bowl game. Last week I got back from the marching band trip to the Capital One Bowl in Orlando. It was an incredible experience.

Before I go into detail about the trip, let me wrap up last semester. So by December 20 I finished all of my final exams and papers. It turned out to be pretty stressful, but I prevailed and everything got done. I was able to enjoy Winter break with my family and celebrate Christmas. We had a great time.
Post-College Opportunity
Also during break I had to take serious time to discern a job opportunity that was given to me by a past mentor from a community organizing internship I had last summer. The job is for a national non-profit organization called, Catholics in Alliance for the Common Good and I will be working until the November election as a field organizer. My duties will be to help build a network of Catholic opinion makers, voters and people across the state to build a dialogue for how our values can best be expressed in politics. Also, I'll be organizing a forum on a major University in the state to get young adults involved among many other things. In short, after a lot of prayer and thought, I decided to take the job. It will be my first real job outside of the University and it certainly fits my interests in social change, politics and faith. This opportunity wouldn't have been possible if it weren't for the experiences and network that the University of Michigan has provided. I'm grateful and excited to start in February, especially as the election heats up!

Capital One Bowl
So, the marching band didn't waste anytime getting us back to Ann Arbor after Christmas. By December 28th we were already practicing our pre-game and halftime show in the 80 degree Florida weather. It was glorious to be back in a warm climate. On our first full day, we participated in the Citrus bowl, which was advertised as no longer than a mile and a half. To the Michigan band people, that seems like nothing compared to the 7 mile long Rose Parade, but believe me when I say the Citrus parade was much worse! It was so hot and muggy and we played the Victors much more often. It's always a privilege to represent Michigan, though and we performed our best.
My favorite part of the trip was that we had a lot of free time. Thanks to our Athletic Department and University, we had enough per diem to spend some time in Epcot and then later we performed and spent New Year's Eve at Universal Studios. On our last day, my friends and I were tired of theme parks and so we explored real Orlando on the city buses and found ourselves in a little Vietnam area of town where we found excellent and authentic food and some neat shops.
My parents and grand-parents came down, too and we got spend a lot time together. Their Peabody Hotel was where the football players stayed and while I was waiting for my parents, we saw Chad Henne and my mom rode in an elevator with Mike Hart! The players' energy and spirit were intense all the way through the trip. You could just tell they really wanted to go out on a high note and do their best! Of course they did.

Michigan 41, Florida 35
Game day was awesome. We started out with a few concerts for alumni and the players. We then made our way into the stadium and performed our last pre-game of the year. Pre-game is where the band bursts out of the tunnel at Michigan stadium into 4 lines that eventually file into a large, block M. We play M-Fanfare and then the full Victors (which I hope all of you will memorize rather than just the trio!). I was so pumped! We were basically playing in University of Florida's home stadium because their fans outnumbered us. I just love showing other college fans our band and our intense pre-game. It was and exhilarating last run. Check part of it out at: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7eephHKlrRA (not the best quality, but a general idea!)

The first offensive run down the field was awesome. Every play I kept praying the team would do their best and each time, they were on fire. It was a close game, but Michigan outplayed Florida and it was good to see a Big Ten team win against last year's national champions and the Heisman Trophy winner. The Capital One trophy presentation was touching because Lloyd Carr was asked what was the best part of being a coach besides being a Michigan Man, and he replied that that was all he needed! I was so proud of all the players, our coach, the band and Michigan in general.

As we finished taking pictures and our last rendition of the Victors, it struck me that I would be taking the maize and blue uniform off for the last time. After four long years, I was done. I wrote in my journal later that although it was sad, I felt fulfilled. I am so lucky and I would never replace my band experiences for anything. They took me to Pasadena twice, San Antonio and now Florida for a win. Besides performing on Game Day Saturdays, band gave me the chance to play for countless University ceremonies such as the funerals of Bo Schembechler and President Gerald Ford.

If you desire to be in Marching band, do it! You will never regret it and you'll never stop singing and playing the Victors down that Michigan Stadium field on a beautiful day in Ann Arbor.

Moving On
We arrived back in Detroit at midnight, picked our luggage up at 1:00 am and started classes the next morning. It didn't even phase me what classes I was taking. So far they are awesome and more challenging than I anticipated. I'm taking Introduction to Islam, Psychology of Consciousness, Evolution and Extinction, and Sociology Project Community. The last one is a service learning class where I'll be facilitating a creative writing work shop at Parr Highway prison. I like my professors and am already deep into the reading and course work.



It's surreal to imagine me graduating in three months. Already I'm getting information about commencement and paying off loans. I am thankful I already have a job in place, even if it's only temporary. I still hope to apply for the Peace Corps for Winter of 2009. But until then, I still have one more semester to enjoy here. It seems impossible that there could be more memories to make, but just like anything at Michigan, life exceeds expectations. Thanks for reading and I'll catch you in a couple weeks.

Brian

ps. We have had such crazy weather. Twice we got over 7 inches of snow, but then right after it warmed up to 60 degrees! Michigan is crazy.