When I was 20, I was employed at Brown's Drugs on 12th Street in Detroit. A couple of blocks south was the church of Rev. Franklin, Aretha's dad. An hour or so before the things got started on a Sunday, many of the congregation would stop in at our lunch counter and for that hour, we were very busy indeed. In the Summer, we might get lucky and the church doors would be open and the choir could be heard . I'm not sure if I could discern 12 year old Aretha (ReeRee to everyone who knew her) in the midst of all that music but she was a cute skinny kid in those days. It's a reminder of how death deprives us of great ones. What a great voice and how fortunate that she really knew how to use it.