This past weekend, I experienced something that was truly nothing less than remarkable. DCI World Championship Finals. As a Trooper. A dream realized. History recorded for the halls of drum corps glory. And from what we in the Troopers learned, it wasn’t just a dream we had as a corps. It wasn’t just a dream shared w/ our staff or our alum in the Long Blue Line.
It was shared by all of DCI.
DCI is a sport with so many corps to love, nobody unites. Nobody can come together under one and applaud as one. There are too many variables, corps rivalries, bitterness that x-corps is beating my favorite, yada yada yada. Until now.
This weekend, I saw something that was once impossible in the drum corps community; all drum corps fans, regardless of history, creed, or race, came together under one corps and rallied them to glory. They united under one flag, even if only for an instant, and made their voices heard, as one entity. Under our Cross Sabers. As soon as anyone mentioned “Troopers,” everyone had something to say “Great show!” “Welcome back!” “Good to see you in Finals again.” “YEAH TROOPERS!!!!!”
Here was the thing that got me. It wasn’t just the fans of the other corps….it WAS the other corps, as well. My friends in Bluecoats telling me they hyped off of our Finals entry as they walked to the show. Vanguard and others cheering us.
One instant will forever live in my mind. We walked out of the tunnel, down the hallways to get back to the buses, and we ran across the Blue Stars, who were in our situation a year ago. Corps on the rise, trying to get noticed, and made 8th in 2008. They did something that I will tell my children and grandchildren about until I die.
They split their ranks, formed a walkway for us right through them, and applauded us as we walked through.
Nobody opens their ranks for anyone else. That’s the rule. That’s just the way things are. If you have to get through, go around, because you don’t go through anyone. Their files and their form is their world. In it, they are all that matters…until that moment. We were so important to those guys, we were allowed into their realm. We were united with them, even if only for a moment.
It was euphoric. It was beautiful. It was sacred. It made me cry…ok, it made me bawl. I sobbed like a four-year-old. In uniform.
We as Troopers have been congratulated for making history. I don’t see it that way. I see it as this: We made Finals, sure, but something greater happened that we didn’t do intentionally. We united all of drum corps under our cross-sabers. That was the history, and as far as I’m concerned, everyone ther made that history with us.
-Jon copp. August 10, 2009.
