In an attempt to raise her kids to be well-rounded, Becky Sauerbrunn’s mother required each of her three kids to play an instrument. Becky played the flute.
“Marching band is the last thing an insecure teenager should be doing in high school,” says Sauerbrunn. “It knocks you down like twenty pegs. You’re marching at halftime – wearing the ridiculous outfit, the tight pants, the jacket, the huge hat with the poofy plume…I’d push it so low down on my face, hoping that none of my friends saw. I would hide my flute in my backpack so that even my closest friends wouldn’t know. I’d say, oh, it’s a paint case. Clearly, they probably knew, but I just made up every excuse.”
Her flute career was not long-lasting. Sauerbrunn, a regular on the youth national teams, notified her band director that an upcoming trip with the youth national team would require her to miss a performance. She was no flute genius – she was not first or second or even third chair. She played the low notes no one really hears and she didn’t think he would be at all upset by her absence. “But he was irate, furious,” says Sauerbrunn. “And he said to me, ‘You’re not a team player.’”
To Becky, there’s probably no worse insult in the world.