I'll Take Manhattan

From 1970 to 1974 I was the vocal star of Guilford, Connecticut. I got every solo in my college choir, I was even the student conductor. I performed in musicals, went to state competitions, and earned a scholarship to study voice.

After high school graduation, I was off to Manhattan--Kansas (the Little Apple) to attend Kansas State University. I had received vocal training, community support, and lots of accolades. I was one very confident eighteen-year-old moving halfway across the country.

I remember the first day I walked into the choir room to audition for the college choir. I am not exaggerating when I say there were more than 100 other freshmen in the room. The upper class students who had already been chosen were in the auditorium. I had extensive musical training and was the star of my high school. What I wasn't prepared for, what I hadn't been taught is that every other kid in that room with me, had been the star at their high schools. Like me, they were the big fish in their small ponds, but now we were in the ocean, swimming with sharks.

My audition did not go well. I did not get selected for the college choir and was assigned instead to the equivalent of a JV team. At first, I felt defiant and cheated. The explanation I received from my advisor when I tried to appeal the decision left me feeling humiliated and embarrassed. How was I going to tell the folks back home? What was I going to tell my high school choir director who had given me his wisdom, knowledge, and hope?

I was not a privileged kid. My parents were blue collar workers and chicken farmers. Our home was a converted chicken coop. My father, a polio survivor, lost everything when one of the coops burned down, followed by the rest of the chickens getting sick and having to be destroyed. The challenges and stresses of home were offset by the music in my life and I had not doubt after college, I would be going from The Little Apple to the Big Apple. I daydreamed about being interviewed by Barbara Walters. I had my life all figured out...until I didn't.

Learning that I wasn't as good or talented as I thought I was, was a blow to my heart and confidence. Instead of making me want to work harder to obtain my dream, I was deflated and defeated. There was no point in going home where I would have to explain how I was at failure at eighteen. Because of my scholarship, which covered my freshman year, I had to take the music courses allocated to my major. Because I was familiar with the material, I did well in my classes.

What is a heartbroken eighteen-year-old girl, thousands of miles away from home where she knows hardly anybody, suppose to do? Crying in my dorm room and listening to the Tapestry album, allowed my to wallow in my teenage angst. It felt that I would never be whole again.

My scholarship only covered a portion of my freshman year, and although attending Kansas State University as an out of state student was less expensive than going to the University of Connecticut, I still needed financial aid assistance in the form of a student loan. Several weeks into the semester, I was notified that my loan had been approved and funds were available to pick up in the financial aid office in the administrative building. On the day I went to get the money, I was wearing my favorite dress, a bright orange mini, with long sleeves and a scoop neck. I am only 4'8", so I always wore platform shoes.

The first thing I heard when I walked into the office was, "You just made my day." His voice was a rich baritone. Like me he was short, only six or seven inches taller than me. I assumed he was referring to my height. I could tell he was flirting with me. I had not really dated anyone and did not go to either the junior or senior prom. That's the thing about choir kids, we tended to travel in a pack.

It was a cool September day. I was taking a shortcut across the band field on my way back to my dorm room. I saw him before he saw me, but there was no where to diverge or hide. "Hello sunshine," how are you doing today. He escorted me back to my dorm, telling me about himself. He was a senior. In that moment, I knew I was in love for the first time.

He taught me about passion and sex. I loved him, but he was not mine to have. He graduated that spring and moved to Houston (with his wife). I was not happy in Manhattan but I dreaded going home. I decided I would finish college as soon as possible, and stayed on for summer school, graduating with my BA in English and Business in three and a half years.

The next decade was a roller coaster ride of highs and lows. I moved to Kansas City and established myself in musical theater and eventually became resident director at a local theater. I worked a 40-hour per week job in purchasing and spent evenings and weekends with my first love--theater. Then in 1983, the theater where I was the director burned down. In the midst of my latest downward spiral, I got a telephone call from Austin, Texas. Divorced, he was getting his MBA at the University of Texas at Austin and invited me to come visit.

We have been married now for thirty-seven years, more than half my life. A few years ago we went back to Manhattan, but so much has changed from those years in the 1970s when a walk across campus on an autumn day forever changed my life for the better.