I learned early on that the world would betray me.

Earth, Wind and Fire was in constant rotation in my house, and I knew every word of their greatest hits. Or so I thought.

“Do you remember the 25th night of September?,” my Daddy always opened their biggest crowd-pleaser. The 25th is my birthday, and that made “September”—everybody’s favorite EWF joint—MY song.

How DARE they have actually been singing about the 21ST?

See, my Daddy was the only person who talked to little me about music and included me in this very serious business, so as far as I was concerned, everything that came from his mouth was GOSPEL TRUTH.

My lesson should have ended there when it came to him and Earth, Wind and Fire, but old habits die hard with Daddy’s girls.

So the day he told me he used to be a touring member of the group, once again, I believed every word. “REALLY?!,” I asked with a thousand more questions on the tip of my tongue. Never mind the reality of our three-bedroom house in little old Beaumont where both my parents worked modest middle-class jobs… 𝗠𝗬 𝗗𝗔𝗗𝗗𝗬 𝗪𝗔𝗦 𝗜𝗡 𝗘𝗔𝗥𝗧𝗛, 𝗪𝗜𝗡𝗗 𝗔𝗡𝗗 𝗙𝗜𝗥𝗘, 𝗬’𝗔𝗟𝗟.

My Mama burst into uncontrollable laughter, and they eventually destroyed my dreams again, but we never did let the joke die. From that day on, anytime and anywhere EWF was playing, we’d insist my Daddy bust out some of his old stage moves, or tell us the story about how they wrote this one.

And to our delight, for his girls, he never hesitated to put on a show.

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