A Story To Tell

So recently I got goosebumps. It was Friday, November 17. I was so pumped since it was the end of the week and we had planned to go out and eat for dinner. I went school like it was a normal day, but little did I know there was a shock waiting for me at school.

There’s this boy in my band, Spanish and math class. His name was Nathan. I never really liked him since he was a slowpoke. He didn’t have any friends at all. He always sat alone at the lunch table with his phone listening to music. People just walked past him without caring. And in class whenever he was asked a question, he would take a long time to answer it. The whole class would get annoyed and whenever he got an answer wrong, the whole class would laugh. I didn’t know why but I didn’t care enough to know.

On Nov. 17, I walked into band class and was ready to play my flute. Mr. Kohler began the class. We played music for a little while then he asked us to tune our instruments. I saw Nathan, he was just walking around like usual looking for something. There is nothing surprising about that, he does that in every class. He doesn’t just sit the whole class period, he walks around looking for Kleenex or a new reed for his instrument. He plays clarinet by the way.

So then Mr. Kohler asked a question to the class: “who in here can tell what note it is just by hearing the pitch?
Nobody raised their hand except for Nathan. The moment I saw him, I laughed but not out loud. I thought he couldn’t do anything properly. How could he possibly guess the note when the pitch is played?

Mr. Kohler even laughed a little and then told Nathan, “come here buddy.” Nathan came and stood in front of the class. Mr. Kohler had a tuner and he played a pitch and asked Nathan to guess the pitch.
Nathan said, “ E flat.”
Mr. Kohler said, “ok good.” And played another pitch. “F sharp.” Nathan said. The whole class went pin drop silence.

Mr. Kohler challenged Nathan by playing 2 pitches at the same time.
“C and B flat” Nathan said.
Mr. Kohler played 3 pitches. “G, A flat, E sharp.” Nathan said.
“Good job, go back to your seat.” Mr. Kohler said.

At that moment I got goosebumps. How did he do that? I said to myself. He guessed all the pitches correctly. That day I realized that I shouldn’t judge people based on little things I see. I need to see the great things people can do.
From that day on I had a different opinion on Nathan. I forgot about all the things he was bad at and focused on the things he was good at. Whenever I saw him, I just said to myself, “that’s the guy that impressed me. That’s the guy who is musically talented.”

Submitted by Anonymous

Character