It's a Brand New Day

"I want to say one ast thing about stage presence before Brown calls you guys to your next class. The best kind of stage presence you can have is to be yourself. By being yourself you let the fans know that you care enough about them to show them the real you," He said while we all sat around listening.

"So what's next?" Ella asked.

"Mitchie and I have Guitar with Jason, Ella you have costume design with Grace, Margret has vocal with Brown, and Caitlyn has hip-hop with Davey," I replied spouting off what I'd read this morning.

"How'd you remember all that?" Ella queried.

"Because we have lunch and then lake time afterwards... I could eat a cow!" I replied.

"You did this morning... Wow for someone so small you eat like nobody's business," Caitlyn replied.

"If food wasn't so good." My stomach groweled to prove my point.

"Everyone to your next activity! Those of you who have the guitar class with Jason, bring your guitars to the lakefront!"

"See you guys at lunch!" Mitchie and I called as we headed towards the cabin to grab our guitars.

Running to our cabin we grab our guitars. I stopped Mitchie before we headed out of the cabin.

"Do I look okay?" I asked her.

"You look like a camper." She smiled.

"Mitchiiie, I'm serious! Do I look okay... How am I supposed to go to class if I look horrible?" I whined.

"August you look fine... Besides it's only Jason... He's a very simple soul... Really... You honestly don't need to do a whole bunch to get him to notice you. Just be yourself, you're pretty darn awesome if I do say so myself."

"Awww Thanks so much Mitchie!" I hugged her, "now let's go... Don't wanna be late." I grabbed her hand and we rushed towards the lake front.

We made it right as Jason was about to say something.

"Okay so before you take out your guitars I'm going to tell a joke. I laugh everytime I tell it, and it's going to introduce what I'm mostly going to be teaching so hopefully someone will catch on." He looked around the circle, "How do you get an electric guitarist to turn down his amp?"

No one answered and he smiled to himself.

"You put a piece of sheet music in front of him."

I couldn;t help myself as the laughter erupted from my throat. It wasn't the funniest thing I'd ever heard, but it was pretty good. Not to mention the fact that most things that people think are stupid make me laugh my ass off. I looked around to see that no one was laughing but me. My laughter died down and I coughed to hide the rest of it.

"I see we have some appreciators of good comedy here, now since you were the only person who found my joke funny, would you like to explain why it's significant to this activity this summer?" He looked at me and asked.

"Because... Uhhhmmm, you want us to learn to play by ear?" I questioned.

"Exactly... I want you guys to learn how to play your favorite songs without Googling the sheet music for it. If you know what the note sounds like you should be able to pick it out with your amazing music hearing ears. Now there are nine of us including me so by the end of the summer each of us is going to know eight new songs. We're all going to take a week and teach each other our favorite songs. And we're going to learn them..." He motioned for us to finsih his sentence.

"By ear," We all finished.

"Good now who wants to start us off? Mitchie? August?" He said.

"I think August should... I mean that song she sang last night was pure genuis right?" Mitchie piped up.

Everyone started agreeing with her. I could feel my cheeks turning red.

"That was a good song you did last night August. Now that we've got our first volunteer, everyone take out your guitars and let's do this thing!"

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"This lunch is amazing!" I gushed as I stabbed more lettusce with my fork.

"You'd eat a dead cat if Mrs. Torres put it in front of you wouldn't you?" Shane teased sitting down next to Mitchie.

"Whatever... I'm sorry that I actually eat. It's not my fault that food is amazing. I'm not going to starve myself when there is perfectly good food to fill my wittle bitty tummy with. Besides my tummy stays little no matter what I eat, it's beautiful." I sealed the end of my sentence by sticking my tongue out and eating the salad that was on the end of my fork.

"Beautiful indeed," Jason said and sat down next to me.

"Ohhh August your ears are turning pink, are you okay?" Ella asked.

"Shut up El!" Margret mumbled nudging her in the stomach.

"And there goes my appetite," I muttered, pushing my plate forward on the table, commencing to bang my head against it.