It was a brisk afternoon in November, 2016. I was at my internship, getting ready to head out for the night. I loaded a stack of folders into my car and answered my buzzing phone. It was my friend Isabella*, and she was mad.
"??????" I texted her back. She told me to look at the group chat. A massive log of messages, the UM French Horn group chat was where all my peers could pick each others' brains, complain, or just chat. I scrolled through a long list of unread messages. I rolled my eyes at my peers' annoyed words, hoping I'd get to the root of the issue soon because I was freezing my butt off.
"People just need to get their priorities in order."
"Oh my god!" I said aloud, surprising myself with the anger in my voice. Another student in my year was angry with low turnout to a concert, so he took to the group chat to express his frustration. He told us that we should be attending more shows, and how we need to get our priorities straight.
Isabella texted me again: "Did you see it?! Like what the hell"
My fingers flew across the screen. My nails tapped angrily on the glass. "This guy! Oh my god! We can't go to everyone's concerts because SOME OF US have other commitments. SOME OF US don't shove our horns up our asses all day. I'm seriously so pissed off!!!!"
Isabella and I texted for a little while longer. We complained about some of our peers--the ones who didn't have any prior commitments. I had my internship, Isabella had her second major. However, we both realized that we wanted to do all of those extra circulars--no one was forcing us to do them. I wanted to continue with my internship because I realized I was learning a lot about performing arts management and Isabella wanted to continue with her Environmental Studies major because she was equally passionate about that as she was with music. We concluded that our other ventures should be recognized in the music school as positive things, instead of chastised for taking time away from our French horns.
“Some people,” I texted Isabella, “just do not get it. And it’s not like we can do anything to change their views. It’s not like we can make them see that there’s more to life that who’s the best at blowing into a tube of metal.”
She agreed with me and told me that we’d get coffee together later in the week. I corralled my papers and binders into the trunk of my car and headed across town, where my cozy apartment waited for me, perched atop a hill.
I loved walking through the door, entering my own little haven. My roommate Dani had been a music major for two years before she decided to study (much to everyone’s surprise, but apparently she has a real knack for it) chemistry. Before we’d signed a lease (and before she’d quit music school) we’d made a promise to each other as roommates: No talking about music school in the apartment. “I spend all day with these people,” I’d told her, when we were both sophomores, “and I don’t want to come home and spend all day talking shit about who played too loudly in orchestra rehearsal.” She’d agreed with me. We were perfect roommates.
“What’s up?” she asked as I flung my bag on the couch.
“I hate the music school!” I exclaimed. She chuckled in agreement. I continued: “I’m sick of getting guilt trips whenever I want to do something besides going to yet another concert.”
Together, we gossiped and bitched about our peers. I rolled my eyes a lot and Dani emphasized just how socially stunted only focusing on one thing makes you.
"I give them props, though," Dani said suddenly. I realized we'd been ripping on our classmates and that we sounded like brats. I shrugged my shoulders and agreed with her.
"Yeah, I mean, we wanted to do that, too. It felt like it was a thousand years ago, but it really wasn't. We wanted to do what they're doing."
"It's too hard," she concluded. "For me, at least. Like, I couldn't deal with the hours of practicing each day, being holed up in those little practice rooms."
I nodded, a silent agreement. "Same. But, I feel like the chips are falling where they've been meant to fall. Even if I'm not going to play after graduation, I got a hell out of my degree."