Orientation.

Many months ago, when I went to Sarah’s house to formally meet her family, Mr. West told me something that has stuck with me even all these years later. He said that anxiety is ‘the mind working in the future’ and it just sounds right. I always, even now, think of the worst case scenario of any uncertain situation. It would scare me and freeze me in place, but thanks to the girls pushing me to be better, I’ve found that those worst case scenarios rarely ever happen. Now I can push past those fears and move forward to do the things I’ve always wanted to do, be the person I’ve always wanted to be.

So of course the moment I start relaxing a bit reality hits me with this mother fucker.

The guy from high school I hate is in my class, the girls who hate ME are in my class, too, and the only other guy I know and I’m in neutral terms with is someone who’s also had it against me in the past.

Not a great start, and if this was the Oliver from a year ago, he would’ve short-circuited already. I’m not him, though, so while this sucks, all I can do is work with what I’m given.

Didn’t expect the teacher to give us an eerily similar lecture once those five minutes passed and all 20 students were in the classroom.

“Now that everyone’s here, let me introduce myself again,” the teacher said. “I’m Steeve Lewis, the head of the music department. Before you start wondering, no you’re not the only music students here. We’ve divided you at random into three groups, mainly because this building doesn’t have large classrooms like the others.” Mr. Lewis sighed heavily and leaned forward with his hands on the desk as he addressed the whole group. “I’ll be upfront with all of you. What you get out of studying music in this university is entirely up to you.”

No one said a word, but I think we all shared the shock of hearing the head of the department bluntly saying something like that.

“Mmm… You, the boy with long dark hair. What’s your name?” Mr. Lewis asked, looking uncomfortably close to me.

“A-Ah? M-Me? I’m E-Eric Bell, sir.”

“What’s your instrument of choice, Eric?”

“T-The drums, sir.”

“Ah, drums. I love drums. You’ll rarely ever get the chance to play drums here.”

Eric’s jaw dropped in confusion, and the rest of us were equally stunned.

“You, girl. What’s your name and what instrument do you favor?” Mr. Lewis asked someone in the front rows.

“Er… I’m Luna, sir. I play the violin.”

“The violin, you say? Well, most teachers here will love you. They will speak at length about the elegance of the and rich history of the violin, of the masterpieces it’s the centerpiece of, and each and every one of them will try to convince you they know the path to greatness you should follow. Ignore every single one of them.”

I had to hold back a snicker, but it wasn’t out of any malice towards Luna. No… I found myself smiling at Mr. Lewis’ words.

“Thoughout your time in this university, you will learn history you don’t care about, learn theory you don’t need, learn to play instruments you dislike, and even those practical classes will be 20% of your time here at best.”

He was saying all these awful things, and yet the frustration and exhaustion in every word… kind of felt reassuring.

“What you get out of your time in this university is up to you. What’s useful to you and what’s not, you’ll have to decide for yourself. You will ask your professors questions about music and art, and take every answer, even mine, as a suggestion. In regards to the question of ‘what should music be like’ there are as many answers as there are artists. My greatest hope, my main goal, is that by the end of these four years, you’ll have started on the path to find your own. This university has a bad reputation when it comes to the arts because, as an institution, they value theory above individuality. We will give you the theory, the history of music, the science behind it. Use those not as iron rules to follow, but as guidelines and tools to find your inspiration and your answers.”

I found myself smirking against my better judgement. He was basically telling us that our classes would suck, that they would be boring and was passing the responsibility of actually learning anything to us. Though I suppose learning is always your own responsibility, but still.

And yet… This had been my mindset all along when choosing this place. I knew learning would be up to me, so… I felt validated, in a way. And it was coming from the head of the department, no less. I don’t know, maybe that made it worse, but I was fine with it.

The professor sighed.“Still, even this is my personal philosophy. If you find that the way your professors do things works for you, please, follow that.” Mr. Lewis then smirked sheepishly. “And if you’d be so kind as to not go around telling everyone of this little speech of mine, I’d be very grateful.”

There was some faint laughter at that, but overall, it seemed to me like the majority of the class either didn’t know what to think of what he’d said or outright found it irresponsible. Then again, I suppose that’s the normal reaction.

Mr. Lewis then went on to give us a rundown on the classes we’d be having this semester. What they were mostly about, the professors who’d teach them and their credentials. What he said earlier began to make more sense when I heard that nearly all the professors had their backgrounds in classical music, orchestras and opera.

For me, that meant one of two things: I would learn nothing in regard to the type of music I wanted to play and create, or I would learn to incorporate classical elements into rock and metal music. The latter option sounded far more interesting.

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