"Hidden You"

Summer going to into 6th grade my parents bought an Xbox 360 and Rock Band to go with it. They bought the complete set; the guitar, the microphone, and the drums. I spent most of the time playing the drums. The first night we got it, my brother and I got into an argument over who would play the drums for the next song. I said I should because I was already on them, but my parents said I had to let someone else have a turn. Angrily, I got up and picked up the microphone instead. I told him I was going to pick the song since he got to play the drums(I was a bratty 11 year old). I decided on "I Think I'm Paranoid" by a band called Garbage, I knew some of the song, but not all of it. My dad took the guitar, my mom, other siblings, and friend Sydney all sat on the couch opposite us. I didn't know anyone was listening to me - hell, I didn't know anyone listened to me in general - but halfway through the song my dad turns to me and says "You're a really good singer, Paisley". My face flushed. The attention was on me now, everyone trying to listen to me for once. I froze. I stopped singing. I said thank you to my dad and quietly sang the rest of the song.

In 7th grade, I made the blod decision to take choir instead of band. The only people who heard me sing was my choir teacher and the people who stood next to me, and my friends - if they could hear me. I took choir all the up until my senior year in high school. I got comments from my classmates and my friends saying I was a good singer. 

Senior year rolls around and I'm not in choir anymore simply because I didn't want to stay at the same level and I didn't like anyone in the level above. Every year at school they do this thing called "Coffee House". Basically, all of the artsy kids gets on stage and sing, or play an instrument, or paint, or draw, or read their poetry, or other people's poetry, whatever. I thought about whipping out my bongos, guitar, ukuele even and getting on stage and singing a song. I thought long and hard about this decision and I decided I wasn't going to because I cannot handle having so much attention on me.

I love singing and playing my instruments, and just music in general. I had my grunge phase in 6th grade as opposed to everyone else who had theirs in high school. I even got a treble clef tattooed on my wrist. 

The attention any type of audience gives me is too overbearing for me to get up and show case my talent.