I know I’ve been promising some folks a discussion on “micro”aggressions against Hillbillies and how condescending, anti-hillbilly elitism may (once again) be the greatest threat to the Democrats’ hopes for the election this year. That writing is coming soon. But this ain’t that, and this story matters, too.

When I was a child, I loved to sing. I enjoyed piano, delighted in guitar, was good on saxophone, had fun playing mountain dulcimer – but I loved to sing.

One of my mother’s favorite artists was Céline Dion. The mother and father I was born to were incredibly gifted musicians with immense talent and potential. Little did I understand as a child, though, that both those parents were also equally emotionally insecure.

They allowed and even encouraged my musical practice, never pushing or demanding more of me than I wanted. But when I did practice or perform, I often received more criticism than praise. They wanted me to be a good enough musician to prove they’d been decent parents, but never wanted me to be a good enough musician to outshine them. I took voice lessons and committed myself to my studies – musically and academically – not merely because I loved it, although I did, but because I wanted to earn their approval. Music became not about feeling for my soul, but about performing for their approval.

How badly my performative, attention-seeking approach failed me in adult relationships with deeply-rooted, emotionally secure musicians who know what passion and devotion really are will remain to be told another time. Or not.

One day in 9th grade choir, I recall crying over not getting a solo part in the upcoming winter concert. I told my choir teacher it wasn’t enough for me to be 6th chair in All-Region Choir; I had to be “the next Céline Dion” if I was going to make my father proud of me. She was perfect in my eyes. Therefore, I could be nothing less.

My teacher didn’t give me the solo. I dropped out of choir the next day and took Speech class instead. This is how avoidant attachment styles happen. Both my parents have avoidant attachment styles, while mine has historically been anxious. If I can’t succeed, withdrawal is a real option. It didn’t matter that I loved singing – because, frankly, how I felt never really mattered to the people I was trying to impress.

That was the last time I loved singing, for many years. As an adult, I was more cavalier than I wish I’d been about testosterone and how it would affect my vocal chords. It’s been ten years, and I’m still recovering from the change; still re-learning to sing, and now remembering how much work it took to learn the first time. Somehow, it didn’t feel like work when I loved doing it.

Now it feels like intense work, because every minute I have to spend learning to sing again is a reminder of my self-abandonment. It’s a reminder of how much effort I put in, and how little I valued it the first time around, when I believed how I felt didn’t matter.

Céline Dion performed at the Olympics this evening. The whole world witnessed one of the most gifted, skilled, dedicated, and inspiring singers to grace any stage in our lifetimes. After years of not performing, and under the conditions that led her off the stage especially, one would not expect such immaculate brilliance of her vocal strength, muscle control, and command of breath as she so breathtakingly-well demonstrated in the rain at the base of the Eiffel Tower.

But Céline Dion made an impact on my life that transcends performance, and it is more clearly visible in the 1997 VH-1 concert below than it was in her magnificent solo tonight at the Olympics. Watching the old performance this evening, I wept.

Céline has performed To Love You More countless times with exceptionally skilled, professional “hired gun” violinists whose names may scarce be remembered. But watch her introduce Trisha Lee here. See how she lifts this young woman up into the light of musical majesty. She is singing this love song to her.

Notice the love radiating from her body like a sorceress.

On its face, the lyrics of this song are about persuading a man to choose her over another woman. But on stage, Céline clarifies that her heartfelt plea is not to any man: She is making the offer “to love you more” to a budding young musician with stars in her eyes and a song in her heart. She is willing to give all the energy in her soul, as if transferring herself and all she has learned, all she has grown, and all she knows, into the young Trisha Lee with an imminently powerful prayer for the young musician’s success.

Life could have been easier had I learned sooner that becoming “the next Céline Dion” has so much more to do with uplifting the hopeful and aspiring women around me – uplifting artists whose hearts are filled with song, and whose presence makes this world worth living in and fighting to protect – than about belting out impressively difficult solos on stage.

Life could have been easier if I had learned to love you more, sooner. I would have learned to love myself more, sooner. I would have learned how to light the way for you to love yourself more, like Céline did for me, as much as she did for every one of us:

When I get around to that post about microaggressions and Hillbillies, perhaps the cultural axis of the world will have positively shifted enough tonight from the power of Céline Dion’s spirit-mending grace that we will all collectively recognize how to uplift one another; how to fill our hearts with majestic, unified song; and how to act on that strength in our every decision, as we cultivate a long-awaited society predicated on loving one another more.