Inauguration Day

Today's inaugural festivities are the first since 1993 that I've watched on TV at home. In the past four inaugurations—Clinton's second in 1997, Bush's in 2001 and '05, and Obama's in '09—I marched with the U.S. Air Force Band. This time around, I was a standby in case a primary percussionist couldn't make it. 

I have mixed feelings about not marching. On the one hand, Inauguration Day is genuinely historic, and being an official part of it, however peripherally, is something to tell the grandkids about. Then again, it is The Mother of All Parades: a marathon of rehearsals (including a full-scale predawn dry run the week before) for an event that dominates the national consciousness for weeks and completely wigs out the detail-fixated and the security-obsessed. 

I wrote this after President George W. Bush’s first inauguration in 2001. It's probably safe to say my colleagues' day today was pretty much like this one, only with better weather.  

On Marching in the Inaugural Parade, January 20, 2001

It’s a raw, cold, wet Saturday in the nation’s capital—Inauguration Day. A parade is in the works to celebrate the occasion. The crowd along Pennsylvania Avenue will brave temperatures in the low 30s, high 20s maybe, to watch the festivities, as dozens of high school, college, civic and military bands, honor guards, drill teams and floats pass by.

I’ll be with the United States Air Force Band, beating a bass drum. I’m 41 years old, for cryin’ out loud. I thought I’d given up marching after my last halftime show in the 1982 Gator Bowl. But now and then, duty calls. This is my second Inaugural Parade. 

I report to Bolling Air Force Base bright and early. Inspection is at 8:15, in the band studio, in the most likely uniform of the day: all-weather coats, hats with rain covers, gray scarves, black gloves. The inspection is thorough, but the atmosphere is relaxed; one rank at a time comes to attention while the others chat quietly. No one is so slovenly as to rate more than a tweak of the hat position or a flick-away of lint.

After a cursory run-through of the parade music (it's already been thoroughly rehearsed in the preceding weeks, as has every other aspect of today's events), the commander gives a mercifully short pep talk, and the drum major briefs us on the day’s schedule. Our job is to be ready in the improbable event that things proceed as planned.

As we get on the buses, our driver, a young Air Force troop, hands us a “straggler’s card,” identifying us as part of Division 4 and giving our bus information and cell phone numbers. Show it to the nice policeman if you get separated from the group today.

The Pentagon is 15 minutes down I-395. Here, in a large tent set up in the parking lot, every single parade participant must cattle through to be electronically frisked. The sensitivity on the magnetometers is set so that every belt buckle, every collar insignia, every metal uniform ornament causes them to screech away about a potentially violent party pooper in the ranks.

After we’ve been scanned, we pick up a free box lunch for later, then stand around for another 20 minutes or so while our buses are being tossed and sniffed for weapons and explosives. Then we reboard the buses and sit for another half hour. I jaunt over to a Port-a-Potty, where I nearly lose one of my black gloves in the deep cauldron of murky blue stuff whose chemical odor is no match for its biological competition. I am reminded of a scene from “M*A*S*H,” in which Radar shows up late for Reveille: “I dropped my watch in the latrine, sir, and I really don’t want it back.”

It’s about 10:30 now. The buses trundle us over to the Mall. A friendly Marine sergeant with a drill instructor hat, a walkie-talkie and a drawl tells us we’ll be “downloadin’ in about a hour. Y’all may as well eat yer lunches, ‘cause ya prob’ly won’t see ‘em again ‘til after it’s all over.”

We also get word that the uniform has been changed. Instead of the all-weather coats and cap covers, we will wear our wool topcoats and we will not wear the cap covers. Apparently someone up the chain has decided there won’t be enough rain to justify the all-weather coats. The topcoats look classier up close, though even from just a parade watcher’s distance it’s hard to tell the difference. There is much grumbling as we make the necessary uniform adjustments.

At about 12:15 we get off the buses, form up and stand there as the misty drizzle begins to glisten on our hats and topcoats. After about 20 minutes, we meander in loose formation to a warming tent set up on the Mall. Inside, it is impossibly crowded and ecstatically toasty. Within this buzzing mass of humanity, each of the marching units in “Division 4” hangs more or less together—a crazy quilt of noble maroons, blues, scarlets and forest greens accented with gaudy gold lamés and glittering silver sequins. The roaring boredom is punctuated with occasional whoops of excitement and outbursts of laughter, as the adrenaline surge of an imminent bug-out gives way to the inevitable “Never mind.” Now and then a trumpet or a clarinet tootles amiably, accompanied by the sporadic pop and thud of idle snare and bass drummers. The faint, tempting aroma of New England clam chowder floats down from the other end of the tent, cups free for the asking. From outside, near the doorway, cigarette smoke drifts in from a few diehard outcasts, puffing away in the cold.

After an hour of bliss inside the tent, we get the order to move out. The sergeant who had earlier warned us to go ahead and eat our lunches tells us we’ll be stepping off at any moment. Out in the wet chill again we form up ... and wait. “Any moment” gives way to five minutes. Five gives way to ten, ten to thirty. By 3 o’clock the rain has let up almost entirely, but the clouds are stubborn and the cold is unrelenting. My toes and fingers are numb.

In the distance other waiting bands run through their musical routines yet again, keeping chops warm against the weather. Many blocks over we can hear the bands in the actual parade. A news helicopter hovers overhead, its monotonous thrum no less a penetrating nuisance than the cold in my extremities. Our drum major wanders among us, chatting people up, trying to cheer away the chill. Nearby, a gaggle of college-band majorettes, wearing little beneath their varsity jackets—“The Royal Dukettes”—giggle and shiver as they wait their turns in the endlessly occupied Port-a-Potties. A military member steps out of a stall, cursing as he shakes off his black glove and rinses it in a rain puddle.

Finally the bands near us start to move. Hot damn. The drum major calls us to attention. It’s 4:15 now; we left the warming tent 105 “any moments” ago. The drum major calls for a stick tap and commands us: “Foh-ward! Harch!” We march about 20 steps. “Band, halt! Rest!” Two minutes or so of standing around. “Drum tap! Foh-ward! Harch!” We march about 20 steps. It’s like I-95 during rush hour ... only on foot. We edge ever closer to the Capitol, still feeling miles away from where we’ll finally plunge into the fray.

At last we wheel our way left onto Pennsylvania Avenue to the strains of “Washington Post.” The crowd is sparse, but cheerful and noisy; security forces are plentiful, silent and alert. The demonstrators for which security is so strongly beefed up are only a token presence, at least from our view in the street. We’d heard rumors earlier that scuffles had delayed the start of the parade. Here along Pennsylvania Avenue I see one sign: “Scalia—how come your vote counts and mine doesn’t?” Later, another: “Barbara Bush—Your son is illegitimable.” Farther down, another: “Democracy, not dynasties.” So much for the protests.

We wheel right at 15th Street and march a couple of blocks to where Pennsylvania picks up again. As we wheel left back onto Pennsylvania, the TV spotlights beckon and the presidential reviewing stand comes into view, across the street from the White House. The end is near, and none too soon. My extremities have thawed out, but the weight of the drum is compressing my spine. The drum is positioned such that if I stand straight with correct posture, I can’t see over the top of it. In order to see where I’m going I have to bend my knees and lean forward a little. My back puts up a protest of its own.

As we approach the reviewing stand, the band’s officer staff, marching up front, renders a salute and eyes left while we play four “Ruffles and Flourishes” and the Air Force Song. I allow myself a glimpse of the official party. This is the third president I’ve seen in real life. It’s pretty cool to be able to say that.

The new president and vice president and their spouses check us out and comment to each other: “Look at that one bass drummer—is he about to faint?”

Once we’re past the reviewing stand, the hard work is done, but the buses are still many blocks away. We march on in silence, a lone snare drummer keeping time now. I am sweating and panting in the cold dampness, and my spine throbs with every thwack of that drum. We halt and fall out at 5:30. I can’t get my drum off quickly enough. The bass drummer from the other end of my rank offers an exhausted high five.

At 7:30, I walk into my living room, ready for beer. My loving teenage daughter greets me with a sweet smile, no doubt proud of her daddy for being part of this grand and glorious event—her daddy, a living, breathing part of history; a slender yet vital thread in the wondrously complex fabric of liberty and justice for all.

“Can you take me over to Kisha’s house? Please? I can get a ride home.”

I feel a spasm in my spine.

– January 21, 2001, Woodbridge, Virginia