Abandonment

Abandonment. 
The first thing I think of when I hear this word is a person physically leaving someone else behind, but sometimes, that is not the case. Have you ever stopped to think of emotional abandonment? When a person is left behind yet you talk to them and hear about them everyday. In the middle of last school year, my color guard team received the best gift we could have ever gotten: a coach. He was the best in the business and cared about everything we did, even when we didn't care ourselves. As we continued to grow as a team, he did not just sit back and watch, he became part of the family that we had formed. After we competed at state and began training for marching season, we began to have summer camps to prepare for the upcoming marching show but he soon became more busy then usual; he had to start cancelling when he came and even hired a replacement for the time he had to coach another school. Recently, he has not seen our team in about a month; this may not seem like a long time for you, but it is when you are stressfully under the pressures of your band directors who look to you, as a leader, to guide your team into success. I have been so confused lately as to why he would completely leave us but I believe he doesn't fully understand the pain he has caused. I feel once someone has done something like this and not take responsibility for it, they do not deserve respect because they did not respect the people they left behind. In all this, I wanted to make this point clear: you should not simply leave because it became difficult or strenuous; life is far from perfect but do not forget about the people you once knew and leave without saying goodbye.
-A