"It could be worse........"

"......it could be raining" **THUNDERCLAP**
- Marty Feldman, Young Frankenstein

It's official. I'm now browsing the SCSBOA web site for jobs. I'm not going out and getting boxes to pack all my stuff in (actually, that would take a U-Haul) but I'm in need of a serious back-up plan. My days at *MY SCHOOL* might be numbered.

I had another one of "those" talks with P, although this time the M------- B--- word didn't even come up. It was all about enrollment, and how next years numbers for the music program are the weakest since I've been there. Conclusion: There aren't enough enrolled students to justify a full days worth of sections for me. Result: Classes will be cut, and I go part time.... unless a miracle happens.

You want to talk about something taking the wind out of my sails.... I went up to the front office to check my mail, and P pulls me in and drops the bomb. The interesting thing is... I don't blame P for this. The numbers are low... rediculously low. We're graduating kids and not replacing them with new recruits. So band shrinks, jazz shrinks.... and orchestra is decimated. (Only the vocal classes seem to be unaffected)

First class on the chopping block: AP Music Theory. I'm not happy about that, but it's the first class I would willingly sacrifice. Being an AP Class, I think I could easily resurrect it in the future. I'm more worried about the runner-up: Orchestra. Once that class goes, we may never get it back... which means that we lose our hold on one of the most important mediums in serious music making.

But the way P is talking right now.... P figures I have enough for two sections....two sections! Friends, there is no way I could live on a part-time salary right now. I mean, if I were single I'd even consider living bare bones just to make it work.... yeah I love this place that much. But there is a wife to consider, and the family we want to have some day.

Now, the paranoid part of me has to wonder if there is any kind of maeuvering on P's part to put me in the exact position I am right now, asking my self these exact questions. I don't think so. And given the fact that P is telling me that admin will do everything to help enrollment... and the fact that P didn't once push m------- b--- makes me want to put a little trust in P.
So why is my spider-sense still going off?

It's one thing to be fighting off the will of a micromanaging tyrant.... it's another when the ground you're trying to defend crumbles right under your feet. There are people walking around on campus that could be signed up for music, but aren't.... because of the demands of the allmighty college application... or because the choice between being in a rag-tag barely surviving orchestra or being on a nationally ranked track team isn't all that hard to make.... or maybe because X 7th grader figured they played clarinet for 2 years already in elementary school (and it's time for something new). Whatever the reasons are, they aren't coming in, and they aren't staying through to graduation.

So... a year from now will I find myself at *INSERT NEW SCHOOL HERE*, thrust back into the world of band boosters, fundraising and drill charts? Oh the irony!

Before, I was just afraid.... now I'm simply numb as I stare into the abysss.