Dress Rehearsal

Tonight is our Christmas Concert. Today was our dress rehearsal.

Mohawk boy strikes again.

When I hear the term, "troubled teen" I usually think low income, single parent/uninvolved parent situations. But now I'm thinking that there is more to it than that. I have a lot of kids who fit the previous description and they are great kids. Great students. After graduation day - they'll do well. So what makes a troubled teen? I feel that there is a sense of self-destruction that some kids have. Even when everything is going well, they feel that they don't deserve things to go well and will literally sabotage their own situation.

Mohawk is a good trumpet player. He has a beautiful tone and he reads well. For a HS kid, that's saying a lot. He does well in band. Quite honestly, I need him there. He carries the group sometimes. Mohawk is being raised by his great-grandmother. He is 16. She is 84. All week he's been telling me about how surprised I'll be at his attire for the concert tonight. He got a white french-cuff shirt and red tie just for the event. He has been joking that he will die the mohawk red to match. He has two very prominent solos. He was proud that his "Mimi" would be there to see him play. She, also, played trumpet once upon a time.

We sat down on stage to begin warming up for the run-through when it happened. He snapped. Like a toddler, for no obvious reason, he lost it. I think it had something to do with his stand or something. It wasn't sitting just right or some other rare oddity. At first the curse words came one by one and within 15 seconds he was in full blown rage. Suddenly we were all idiots and the school was the dumbest place on earth. (Rated G version, of course) He walked off the stage and never returned. I sent word to security and eventually he was picked up and sent to ISAP (in-school suspention). I learned later that he walked out of there as well and left the building entirely.

I wish desperately that this had happened any other day except today. I wanted him to have tonight. I wanted tonight to go well and him be proud.

I'm sure that there was a reason behind this tantrum of which I am unaware. I'm sure it has been escalating over time. But why choose now to let it take over? Over something so small?