MORE Color Guard Stuff

I think I have posted about color guard every day since it began. But oh well, here is more!

Today we finished learning the routine that we would do at the parade in Taylorsville (Note to self: be there at 8:30 am.) and I am practically in love with it! As I was walking home with Kenna, we both couldn't stop doing it! I have the urge to go do it some more outside right now, but I will wait a little bit. I hurt too bad from it!

If anyone ever said that marching and color guard were easy, they were wrong! Even simply the walk we do (glide step) gives you a workout! As the instructor stated it (and I quote), "If you don't feel the burn in your buns, you're not doing it right!" And he was right. Marching is extremely difficult! You have to memorize what all of the verbal commands mean, then they change it so that you have to learn all of the verbal commands as whistle commands! Plus, you add the fact that you have to spin a flag to your step, and you have one difficult mess.

I think I might like this routine better because it isn't as repetitive as simply doing drop-spins nonstop into the wind, with the flag in your face (As Kenna said, "I'm practically eating it!"), being yelled at that you are beginning to do both the marching and the drop-spins wrong, and losing your water bottle to a lawn mower (all I know is that suddenly the lawn was mowed, and the water bottle was gone) with the sun getting in your eyes. All of that put together (especially the drop-spins part) makes for very sore arms. Hopefully the lack of complete repetition will make for sore arms slower.

Plus we have to run two laps around the track before we begin marching, and are expected to run back to the parking lot to get into our stretches and push ups. Luckily, the leaders became smart and had us do this before color guard and band practiced, so it was early enough in the morning that it wasn't hot. Many people were actually cold (I thought it felt nice) and found out that if you wrap your flag around you, it is very warm. Nice to know. And it is difficult to find the beat when they are playing music. I often find myself looking at the feet of the people in front of

I'm not near as worried now that I won't be ready for the parade, but still a bit. We have 8 parades in two months total though! July 3rd we have a parade, and on the 4th we have two! Even with all of my worrying though, I am still happy to have decided to join color guard. I originally didn't want to join, but I just went to a meeting with Kenna and was bored, so this is what I got myself into.

I really need to shut up about color guard.