Whitney Elizabeth

Whitney Houston had the most beautiful voice a woman could have.
Additionally, she was both athletic and artistic in her deliveries.
She could not have been more musical.
It may have cost her dearly to try so mightily to suppress the musician in her for so many years,
but through it all, she always was Whitney. She was a giver. In life and in music, she was a giver.
She could open a phrase in any way she chose. She could make a note in any key, from
any part of the scale beautiful in any musical context, and hold it until even listeners felt out of breath.
I've heard I Believe In You And Me a 'million' ways, done wonderfully by a 'million' singers and
choirs; but after hearing her do it, I don't even recognize it anymore when I hear it until the
performer is well into the song. That song is not itself any longer. That song is part of Whitney Houston now and forever in the ear of those like me who not only heard her sing it, but experienced her singing it. Hearing Ms. Houston sing was a bit like hearing the late opera stars Dame Joan Sutherland and Mr. Luciano Pavorotti perform 'In Questa Reggia'... unforgettable...
Her voice control, and breath control was masterful and she knew it. She knew, loved, caressed, and nurtured her vocal gift.. A lesser vocalist would surely have fainted after some of the
runs and expressions she accomplished, even at the end of some of her performances.
My heart goes out to her only child now because many times when a parent seems overwhelmed
to a child, the younger person mentally takes on the parenting role whether or not it has become necessary.
If something goes awry, the younger person cannot be dissuaded from accepting blame. As
desperate as it sounds to young people, no effort can stop every unwanted outcome, no matter how awful the outcome may be.
The young accept this only intellectually. Helping this reality seep into someones heart is much more difficult than helping it sink into that person's head. The young need to feel some invincibility at the start of more adult emotional lives.
I have to wish Bobbi Kristina love and luck in this matter. If she can give up believing things should have been different, she can grieve by living through, and then beyond mom's legacy.
Cissy has a different sort of grief. Burying a child is unimaginable. But she should take some
comfort knowing she gave her daughter the skill and technique to do what she really, obviously, just had to do...good or bad, right or wrong. Whitney Houston had to perform, and she had to
sing. It is my belief that only her mom could have given her what she needed in order to love her
abilities as much as she needed to love them.
As wonderful as Whitney Houston's music is, I truly have never ever heard anyone manipulate the sound in a note of music the way Cissy Houston's can do it.
I don't see how it even could be taught, unless a child experiences it repeatedly from birth, then
is able to make a part of it a part of herself, or even of himself. It is obviously something a bit genetic in some families.
What better hope for being a mom could any of us have than to make sure our children
obtain that one nearly intangible thing of  special  identity no one else in the world has, and it be the thing that young person comes to want more than anything else. We  want our young people to love their gifts more than anything else they could  have had or wanted from first sensibilities after birth.
We couldn't get more than that from being mom; and Cissy Houston has had that. Nothing can ever take that from her.
Cissy has to realize now that Whitney's ancestors must have come to her to explain to her that her
loving, nurturing, giving was over in her earthly form. God had expressed through her for so long that He wanted her back. I imagine she was very upset about it; but I also imagine her ancestors let her know as gently as possible that her work on earth was done now. Whatever her faults and troubles
may have been, those who loved her have to believe those problems were in enough balance to make
certain her faith brought a balanced end to them all.
Her forebears may have had to tell her she was done giving in her present form.
She would not be so giving in another performance.
She would not be so giving in suppressing herself again for anyone.
She would not be so giving, in person, in her encouragement of other singers.
She would not, though it was wonderful for her to be doing it, be spending one more dime on behalf of friends and neighbors who could never pay it back.
They explained that she had given of herself in this world for the last time. The time had simply
come for her to be gifted herself, in eternity.
Cissy Houston should take some comfort in knowing her child will never have to bury a child or
a grandchild. Cissy's child will never have to lose a thing, ever again.
And when Cissy Houston's day of reckoning comes to pass, she should believe what I believe,
that her baby girl will come to escort her mom, herself.