u/affectionate4fish

Halito!

I currently play in my college's jazz ensemble as a flutist. It's unique but I (and my professor) would like if I played a more traditional jazz instrument. I'm also a music major so eventually I'll need to be proficient on most instruments so to me, this is a good place to start.

We have a small army of saxophones in this band but I want to move onto saxophone so it's still in my woodwind world since I'm not ready to tackle brass yet.

We have:

2 first altos

3 second altos

2 first tenors (one of whom is actually playing clarinet)

1 second tenor

1 bari

I'm thinking I'd like to play soprano. My professor is a master at the soprano sax and we have lessons together every week (just currently on flute) but I understand it's not traditional to have soprano in a jazz ensemble or to even start on soprano.

Should I pick a different sax? My husband plays second alto so he said if there's a tenor available, he'd like to play tenor. This leaves me with my options of soprano, alto, or bari (if there's one available)

Thoughts?

Halito!

I went to the Okla Chahta gathering a few weeks back and saw a beautiful set of ermine pelts for sale. I've seen them used for lots of things. Personally, I think they look super gorgeous draped from braids. I really wanted to purchase them BUT I've never seen them used in chahta culture and I didn't want to be disrespectful by using them improperly.

I tried Googling but as we all know, Google is not the greatest when it comes to this kind of information.

Here's my questions:

1. Are ermine pelts in the hair specific to a region or group? If so, which one(s)?

2. Is everyone welcome to wear them or is this closed practice?

3. Are they only worn during dance/ceremony?

Yakoke!

I want some general advice on how best to go about this since there's no easy answer.

Long story short, my sister and I hold a lot of resentments towards each other. We've been on and off fighting for years and there's a lot of problems that would truly require professional mediation to work through.

We had our last argument a few months ago and after this argument, I decided I didn't have anything nice to say. I fell off the face of the earth and ghosted them. I know not my finest moment but this has been a long time coming.

She's been complaining to other family members trying to get me to talk to her so I decided I owe her a letter explaining why I stopped speaking to them and setting the terms of our relationship going forward. It's not going to be pretty but I genuinely think we would serve each other best as "holiday family". No expectations on life updates, etc etc. We see each other during family events and leave each other alone otherwise.

I don't think this is going to go well but I'm kind of at a loss for what else to do. I am not a victim but it's up to me to break the silence. Particularly for our little brother who still needs us both in his life for birthdays and important events.

Our relationship is beyond apologies and needs professional help and I know neither of us are in a place to go to counseling together.

What would you write in this letter? How would you phrase things so they're not insulting? Would you write this letter? I think things would go very poorly in person or over the phone and I don't really want things to be up for discussion. Right now, it's either we're holiday family or we're no contact.

I am a Trinity. Not named after the matrix or religious reasons (although you'd think so with the middle name Faith). It was just an "I liked the name" thing. Although I do consider 3 my lucky number.

In my accent, Trinity is said "trih nih dee" or sometimes "trih nuh dee". It doesn't roll off the tounge easy and is especially difficult while speaking Spanish (a daily occurrence for me). Many native Spanish speakers struggle to pronounce my name in my accent and I end up pronouncing it totally different.

My entire life, people have considered my name a mouthful so it will get shortened to "Trin" which I can't stand as a nickname. I haven't really been able to get any preferred nickname to catch on either. At the coffee shop, I just tell them my name is Trout like the fish to save time.

My name is also very often forgotten. My name is almost always mistaken when I say it. Usually I'm called Tiffany but I also get Tina, Trina, Destiny, Brittany, and even once Tristan.

I also one time had a racist person say "isn't that a black girl's name?" as a negative (I'm white/indigenous)

My husband says he loves my name because he associates it with me but I have a hard time seeing the upsides. I want to see if anyone dislikes my name for similar reasons or has reasons why they enjoy it and why I should enjoy it too

Thank you

I work in a school running an extended learning program. I have seniority on staff and people with the most seniority are considered mentors for staff who haven't been there for very long.

We work with elementary aged kids and our older kids can be a pain as they age into teenagedom. We're taught explicitly to not get into power struggles and if you can't handle a situation, find someone else to help.

My coworker (19F) has been getting frustrated with the older kids and getting into arguments with them. Today it happened again. A kid made a bad joke about taking something of hers and she started shouting at him and arguing with him. The child was disrespectful after the shouting started. He was made to apologize (by several different adults).

After the incident, I pulled her aside and told her that after she calmed down, she should apologize to repair their relationship (relationships are everything in our job). She insisted she did nothing wrong. I told her I saw the whole thing, reminded her that she's the adult and it'd be good to apologize then I walked away.

Later my supervisor came to me and said I was out of line and she would have corrected it if she thought it was a problem. She said I made my coworker uncomfortable.

My question is: was I the asshole for telling her she should apologize? I'm not her boss but I am her coworker and these are our students. We're supposed to love and protect them.

I've been irritated all day. I've already found another job because of various issues with management but I have to bide my time until the end of the school year

Halito!

There's a MMIP event happening in my town on Friday and this is the first year I've had the chance to attend.

Should I wear my regalia or a ribbon skirt? We generally wear regalia for anything important or formal in my experience but I'm not sure if this falls into that category. It's important yes but I don't want to seem like an attention seeker at an event that's not about me.

Thoughts?

Yakoke

Hello!

I'm looking into where to transfer to with the ultimate goal of teaching middle or high school music/band. I qualify for free tuition through the university of California and I have my eye on UC Berkeley but they don't offer bachelors of music. Only bachelors of art in music.

Is UC Berkeley a good program to attend with this as the ultimate goal? Do I need to attend a program where I get a bachelors of music? Sonoma State is my second choice since they actually have a music education program but I don't have guaranteed free admission with the CSUs

Thanks!