'The Miseducation of Lauryn Hill'

In 1997, I first fell in love with a girl. Her name was April. I'd met you by happenstance at a Christian/youth hangout in the small East Texas town that I was raised in.

She was cute and sociable. Everything I'm not. We "went out" for a little bit, but we went to different schools and, frankly, I should not have been "going out" with anyone because I was a lousy boyfriend. Just lousy.

Several months later, we connected again. She ran a snow cone stand that her father owned and I would loiter there for hours. Just talking and eating coconut snow cones. We'd go to movies, talk music, hang out and all the other stuff that actual boyfriends and girlfriends do. Except there was no making out.

One thing we had in common was Lauryn Hill. I think she was the fan first. She was kind of a white hippie artist. At the time, I thought the world began and ended with rock music. Hip hop and soul had no place in my vernacular. Then "Doo Wop (That Thing)" and "Everything is Everything" were released as singles and I was hooked. I became a huge fan and listened to The Miseducation ... about 100 times.

For my birthday, that July 1999, April bought me concert tickets to see Hill perform at the Starplex in Fair Park in Dallas. We could not have been more out of place. Two white teenagers amid 9,000 black people. She bought a handmade T-shirt in the parking lot. We listened to Rage Against the Machine to and from the concert in my 1995 Red Chevrolet S-10.

We saw a young OutKast do "Rosa Parks."

I'll never forget any of this. Ever. One of the greatest albums of my life.