Kristin Huang (Lee?) - Finding Resonance

 

I'm six years old and I'm crouched in right field during tee-ball practice in my hometown of Iowa City, Iowa. A kid hits a fly ball my way, and I run, and I dive and I shout, “I've got it. I've got it.” But I miss it. From across the field, the shortstop calls, “Hey, are you a boy? You sound like a boy.” My coach and teammates all hear him. They don't say anything, but I'm indignant. “Are you kidding me? Look at my long black hair tied back in a ponytail. Look at my white tennis shoes with pink laces. Clearly, I'm a girl.” But his teasing cracks open a doubt in me. 

 

So, that night, I go home and I use my parents answering machine to record myself. I play back my voice over and over. I record myself singing Happy Birthday. I record myself pretending to answer the phone. I record myself shouting, “I've got it. I've got it,” the way I did on the field that day. For the first time in my life, I hear myself the way other people hear me, “Whoa, I do have a really deep voice. A boy's voice.” I'm flooded with embarrassment. But this does explain a lot. It explains why at church I have to sing in falsetto in order to match the other girls and even grown women. I don't like the way my voice sounds when I force it up an octave, but I have always unconsciously done it, so that I'm not singing in the same register as the men. 

 

I play back another loop of the answering machine. Okay, so this is why I can always make other kids giggle when I roar like a lion. It's so realistic from the back of my throat, all scratchy and raw. This is why adults sometimes do a double take when they hear my little girl's body speak for the first time. And I think, God, this is so unfair. I'm already the only Chinese kid in my school full of white Iowans. Do I really have to be the girl with the boy's voice too? 

 

After that tee-ball practice, I get really good at being quiet and blending in. I stop singing at church. I hide all the parts of me that are different, even if that means disowning my heritage, not speaking up, not having my own opinions. 

 

Eventually, I leave Iowa to go to Boston for college. I think this will be a good time for me to find my true voice. It's college, right? But it turns out not to be so easy. One evening, I am watching my friends perform in the school's gospel choir concert. I feel my soul just soaring with those harmonies and those lyrics, and I think I would love to be on stage with them, creating this beautiful music. I want to join. I want to be a part of that community. But then, the fear sets in, “What if they put me with the baritones?” Or, “What if I don't make the cut at all?” I'm so ashamed of my deep voice that I don't even try out. 

 

When I find out a couple months later that our school funds traveling fellowships to go abroad for the summer, I apply immediately. I want to get as far away as possible. I apply to go to China, not just because it's on the other side of the globe, but also because I wonder, will it feel more like home? I arrive in China, and I'm supposed to be working in an orphanage for kids with special needs. But really, I'm just escaping. I don't know the first thing about kids. 

 

On my first morning there, I wake up while it's still dark out and I board two different public buses that take me through the sprawling city of Nanning, near the border of Vietnam. As I ride the bus, I look at the faces of the people around me. And it's incredible. They all look like me. They look like they could be my mom or my dad, my cousins or my aunts. 

 

Being Chinese doesn't carry any baggage in China. It feels like that just allows me to take more pride in who I am, in my culture and in my heritage. And because I'm not using up all this energy trying to blend in, I feel free. I feel light. 

 

By the time I get to the orphanage, it's hot and it's humid. The orphanage is a big building with gleaming pink tile floors. I'm assigned to a room of 30 children, ages zero to five. They're packed in tight rows of cribs. I look around at the room and there's not that many toys. It turns out my glasses are a big hit. The kids love taking them off my face, trying them on and passing them around. That first week there, I bond with two girls in particular, Bao Yan, who is four and has cerebral palsy, as we do her PT and her OT exercises, and I bond with Chenyuan, who is just a baby, not even one. 

 

My colleagues find out that I play piano. So, they rig up a keyboard for me in that room, and they have me do music therapy with the kids. I play piano for the children every afternoon. My colleagues want me to sing too, but I tell them, “No, no, no, I don't sing.” Because even though I feel freer here in China, my voice still feels like a liability. 

 

A few days later, my co-workers are at a staff meeting, and I am alone in the room with all the kids. It's nap time, but they're mostly awake and crying in their cribs. The only thing I can think of to do to soothe this room full of crying kids is to sing. I sing the only song that I know all the verses to, Amazing Grace. I walk around singing, and I place my hand on each child and I cry. As I sing, the kids quiet down. They stop crying. It turns out they don't care that my voice is awkwardly deep. They show me that when I sing in falsetto to try to be like everyone else, my voice gets all thin and weak and shaky. 

 

But when I sing in my natural register, yeah, my voice might be deep. It might be different, but it is rich and resonant and powerful. And that makes me feel invincible. That something I've been ashamed of my whole life can bring peace and comfort. So, when the kids ask me to keep singing that day, I do. When they ask me to sing again the next day, I do. Every day for the rest of the summer, I sing to these kids, and I sing for them and I sing for myself. I once was lost, but now am found. Thank you.