I'm a band geek. And I never went to a band camp at all, let alone the racy one immortalized in American Pie.

I loved band. I fit in the band in high school, and again in college. I wasn't pretty, I wasn't a cheerleader. I tripped over my feet in dance. I felt stupid in drama. I sucked at every sport I ever tried. But I loved band. I loved the uniform, the tall furry black hat, the stiff red coat and stupid white shoes. The sound of the drumline got my heart racing. I hear a drum cadence, even now, and my feet want to march. I count, I step on the downbeat. God I remember it all. Of all the ridiculous pagentry that goes with high school football, it's the band that I loved most.

I played flute all through college too, although my college didn't have a marching band. We had an excellent concert band, with a composer as the conductor. We traveled in a bus and a giant truck full of instruments, and played in high schools and churches all over the west coast. Good times. But I missed marching.

And here I am. I'm 45, with kids in middle school, gray hair, a job, house, lawn, husband, and dog. I joined a marching band. It's all adults, former high school, college, and military band members. I'm practicing music again on marching band sheets so small I can't see them without reading glasses. And I've realized why I loved this so much.

As a band geek, I can hide. I'm not a soloist. I love music, I sing in the car, I pick out tunes from the radio on my flute. But in a band, especially a big one, I'm anonymous. I'm in a uniform so you can't tell which one is me, and I can slot my second flute part in the middle of a chord. I'm a cog in a giant machine. It's greater than the sum of its parts. A bunch of aging players, put together, who sound incredible.

Unlike sports, I can practice my part alone, over and over. No one can hear me screw it up. The calendar keeps me practicing day after day. Band geeks like me don't improvise. We don't deal well with split-second decisions, or objects that fly through the air that we have to catch. We follow the sheet music, we follow the director, we follow the person next to us, we listen. Like a sparrow in the brush, we camouflage ourselves. But together, we're something more.

We have our first practice for the season this week. There are 500 members in the band. 500! We're practicing for two parades in June. When we march, the band is three blocks long. I'll play that soaring high line above the trumpets and trombones, I'll hear my part harmonize with the clarinets and the saxophones, and I'll feel the drums resonate all through my chest. From a distance, flutes add the "shimmer" to the band. The brass are loud, but the flutes give the shine.

One memory of my first year out of college comes back to me now. I worked in an office, a "good" job, with benefits and a 401K. I was 22 and miserable. While photocopying some forgettable document, I looked at the clock. It was 3:30. Time for band rehearsal. And I realized that chapter in my life was over. I'd never again have the luxury of band practice at 3:30 in the afternoon, three days a week. I nearly cried there at the photocopier.

I've spent so many years, the last thirteen to be exact, doing everything for my family. Like  the good mom I think I should be, I cart kids to soccer, swimming, violin, day camp, and science camp, every enrichment I can think of. Whatever writing I do is late at night after everyone is in bed. I can't think of the last time I put something on the calendar to enrich me.

So here I am. It's been a long time. But I can say it for the first time in 25 years.

I'm with the band.