With long blonde hair, a twirling skirt and bright pink nail polish, I began performing at four years old. Standing on my stage, err, fireplace, I sang loudly to my audience of teddy bears and bunny rabbits and put on quite a show for being such a shy child!

Using the infamous brown plastic Fisher Price™ tape recorder, my brother, sister, and I often sang made-up songs and sent them to my grandparents living in Omaha, Nebraska. We frequently hid the tape recorder in a brown cupboard while cleverly recording ridiculous conversations at the dinner table. [Hello, blackmail!]

My sister, Melissa, was extremely bossy [typical of the eldest], I was the whiny middle child, and my little brother, Justin, was the cute little fart who couldn’t say his “R’s”. My parents were really into 80s rock’n roll. My dad had a long permed mullet, and so did my mom, I think. My parents were very musical, and as far back as I can remember, so were we. My brother used the same fireplace [that was my stage] to jump off with his “danna danna” which was his yellow and white guitar. He had long hair then, too; and he used to head-bang when playing along to Stryper or Mylon LeFevre & Broken Heart!

Fast forward twenty years.

I look at my family today and the musical dreams stirring; I can’t help but be proud. My mom and dad both play and sing regularly and perform at local Opries in the Dallas area. Melissa has recorded on several albums in English and Spanish and co-leads worship in one of the fastest growing churches in the country. Justin deserves a paragraph all for himself: Playing in nearly a dozen countries just since the beginning of 2009, his talent increases just as his opportunities for national and international exposure increase. I’ve never seen someone have the chance to do what he does at age 22.

And I am just beginning to really figure myself out musically. With so much change and rebirth in the last year, it’s like a discovery each day as my voice heals and is stronger [and my heart as well]. With a new sound and a new story, I use music more now as a means to communicate myself than I ever thought possible before. I ache if I cannot sing. I wake up some mornings having written songs in my sleep… it’s so surreal sometimes. Now, when I listen to the songs that I wrote as a child, I am certain that half of them, by their last stanzas, had the melody from “Hark, the Herald! Angels Sing.” I suppose I really liked that song. That being said, I think I’ve come a long way!!

Sometimes I still feel like the little girl who twirls and sings on the fireplace. I know those dreams will take me somewhere. In the heart of a young woman now, there lies a dream that has stood the test of time; it’s surpassed every desire and has been branded upon my heart – defining who I am and who I am meant to be.