I have known Shilah for going on six years. She is a phenomenal singer and beautiful on the inside and out. January 29, 2007, Shilah won 1st runner up in the Miss America Pageant. She has set a few records in the pageant world. She is the first black woman to reign as Miss Texas in it’s over 80 year history and she is one of few women to climb the pageant ranks and get to the Miss America level on the first try. This story follows her rise to Miss America.
Immediately after meeting Shilah I found out she was a talented artist. We were both boarding a plane from Dallas to New York. She was going as a singer, to meet with some people. I was visiting a law school. Soon after that she’d made Texas her permanent home, I took a producing job in East Texas and our friendship grew. Moving to Texas for her meant she was slowing down her work in music and she became depressed about her now non existent music career. She enrolled back in school and I began searching for opportunities for her to continue singing. I was producing news in East Texas and would commute an hour and half almost every weekend to stay with her and her family. I was sad because my family was not very accessible when I’d go home for those weekends, but happy that Shilah’s family took me in as one of their own. Shilah sang at quite a few gigs that were from my connections and networking. But I knew she was still depressed about her singing career and confused about what she wanted to do outside of singing, so I started to dig deeper for something more exciting for her.
About three years ago I stumbled upon a website advertising a small local pageant and thought this could be the ticket for Shilah in many ways. Winning the pageant would mean she could obtain money for school and a chance to continue to use her talent on stage. Of all the opportunities I suggested she take advantage of, this one she would not do. I remember her asking me if her mom put me up to this. She thought her mom was asking me to get her involved with pageants. A few years back Shilah left Howard University on one man’s promise to get her signed with a record label. After leaving school to pursue her singing career, her parents were stuck paying a college bill from a school she did not obtain a degree from. Two years later, Shilah was back at home starting the college thing all over again. So this time her parents wanted her to work at obtaining her degree financially herself. They all agreed she’d live with her parents, work and go to school. The time Shilah and I spent together helping each other created a friendship that is more like sisters. The third time I approached Shilah about the pageant, I’d gotten more details about the pageant and was able to tell her if she applied she had two months to decide if she would do it or not. I brought it up when she again complained she did not know how she would pay for her books and some other fees that next semester. She was working so hard and getting little money in return. I told her winning the pageant would take care of that. The pageant officials told me she would not pay the $100 application fee if she applied and actually competed. I simply told her the check would hold her spot in the pageant and again she had two months to decide if she wanted to partake or not. She gave me a signed, blank, check I filled it as well as the application out and took it to the Miss Plano/Frisco organization. The closer it got to the competition that October, the more I hounded her about not going to their rehearsals. I finally told her if she did not compete they would cash that $100 dollar check, and we both knew she could not afford it, so she finally went. I was not able to attend the pageant because I was taking care of my mother who’d had her first stroke that year. When Shilah won the title of Miss Frisco I was so excited and she was happy about being able to use the money for college fees. Her winning the pageant meant she was going on to the Miss Texas pageant. In November 2005, after applying for a full time job after job in the Dallas area for a year, I received a call from a news affiliate in Kentucky offering me a job as lead producer for their morning show. At the time I was not sure that I wanted the job or to move to Kentucky. Finally in February 2006, I accepted the job and moved to Kentucky. By July I was not able to get home to attend the Miss Texas pageant. Also, because the pageant was televised only in Texas, I could not watch the pageant. I’d texted as many people as I could in Texas telling them to watch the pageant. One of those people was my cousin Amber. I remember going to a Rickey Smiley comedy show that night in Louisville, Kentucky and trying to put the pageant in the back of my mind. Shilah had been through so much in preparing for the competition, she was calling me every week about how the other girls had so much financial support and that she got in the competition for scholarship money and could not afford to purchase a $3000 dress like the other girls. It seemed the money it cost to participate in the pageant was adding up to be more than it cost to attend the community college she attended. I felt horrible for not being there to help her through it all. As I sat in the crowd at the comedy show and focused on the comedians performing, the less I was able to think about Shilah and the Miss Texas Pageant. Then just as Ricky Smiley began his set I received a text from my cousin Amber, in Texas. It said, “Did you know that she was going to win?!?” I almost ran out of the building trying to respond, “WHAT?!? She won?!?” Don’t get me wrong, I knew that Shilah was a winner, but with all the complaints I’d heard from Shilah about not having the money to do the things necessary to prove that she wanted the crown and I’d heard about the Texas organization never crowning a black woman as Miss Texas, so a little part of me was afraid that she would not win. Later that night, I received a phone call from her step father giving me details of the good news. The sound coming from the phone made it hard to even hear him. I did not know who it was at first then I made out him telling me, “Shilah told me to call you…” Her whole family was excited. For the Miss America Pageant, there were even people I did not know from the Miss Texas organization who were saying I had to be in Las Vegas for this event. I’d missed the last two pageants and since her first win she’d been talking about me in almost every interview. Shilah went on to take 1st runner up. This was devastating to all of us. First runner up would simply go home with her earnings and soon be forgotten. At the family ‘celebration’ after the event I realized I did not know what to say to Shilah. I also knew if it were not for me she would not be sitting there asking, “What happened? I did not win, I was sooo close but I did not win.” The thought made me feel sick.
In Vegas, there was a woman from Sony in Miami FL who approached Shilah and a group of us at different times who told us Sony would be interested in working with Shilah, but no one knew the woman’s name. All we knew about her was, “I’m with Sony, Miami…” I never asked for a card because I was in pageant territory now- she had ‘people’ and every time I suggested something I was ‘in the way’ so I was afraid that someone would yell at me for approaching the woman. By the time that feeling was gone, so was the woman. I’ve been calling, emailing and contacting people about Shilah and the woman with Sony. I even called Sony/BMG in Miami attempting to track down the woman who approached us. Nothing seems to give. From my understanding Shilah’s whole life has been full of almost’s, but just like the singer, Brandy crooned, almost doesn’t count. Maybe three is still hope…
Right now Shilah is finishing school and working on a new demo tape.
