Unfinished Work

Later that afternoon, as we were pulling away from the school, panic hit me. I had left my trombone behind. The mistake cut deeper than it should have. I replayed it over and over — how could I forget something that important? That heavy brass instrument wasn’t just metal. It was responsibility. It was identity. But I was a kid, and kids are still under construction.

We speak too soon in life. We react too quickly. At the time, we don’t know that missteps are part of learning, that awkwardness is part of adolescence, that pride, ego, insecurity, and even forgetfulness are signs of something forming. We expect polish when what we’re really living through is progress.

Randy Storie used to say, “It’s about the trip.” The work is the joy. The building. The adjusting. The refining. If you asked most conductors, I’d bet they would tell you rehearsal is the best part — not the performance. Rehearsal is where growth lives. It’s where wrong notes get played with confidence and corrected with humility. It’s where frustration becomes breakthrough. The performance is the necessary award. It matters. It’s earned. But it only exists because of the unfinished days that came before it.

As a teacher, I could often see what a student was about to do before they did it — the hesitation before the missed entrance, the confidence before the cracked note, the distraction before the mistake. That didn’t mean they lacked choice; it meant growth has patterns. Immaturity has tells. So does courage. Every wrong note teaches something — especially the ones played with conviction.

That’s the lesson I keep coming back to: we are unfinished work. The shine in a student’s eyes never came from perfection — it came from discovery. From trying. From failing and stepping back in. The child in that photo had no idea what he would face or what he would build. He didn’t know that resilience would matter more than applause. He was unfinished. So am I. So are you. And maybe that’s the point. The trip is the gift. The work is the joy. The award will come. March on.