Once, choral speech coach Abigail Goldsmith was in sixth grade, attending a writing conference. Then she was in college, finishing second and third place in the writing competition as well as having her work published in the school’s literary magazine.

Her most recent writing accomplishment comes in the speech world, where she’s written West Delaware’s last two choral pieces, which have each performed at All-State.

Goldsmith was inspired by Taylor Swift’s song “The Best Day” and began writing this year’s original piece, “Once I Was,” in July. She wanted the message to be about how important moms are to kids. 

 “‘The Best Day,’ reflects on Taylor’s childhood and the bond she shares with her mom, so I wanted to base it off that,” Goldsmith said. “After I saw the mother-daughter relationship in the ‘Barbie’ movie, I couldn’t sleep one night and began writing.”

Unlike the previous year, Goldsmith wrote the story without any feedback from seniors. The story was finished in October, with large-group practices starting at the beginning of November. 

Goldsmith centered the story around how a daughter’s bond with her mom changes throughout her life. Seniors Audrey Jolley, Ashleigh Hartman, and Erin Wegmann played the role of the daughter at different stages in her life. Senior Dajiah Foster played the role of the mom, and eight other group members played smaller roles.

“I felt that it was fitting for the seniors in my group to have the roles of the daughter and mom because it was their last year of speech,” Goldsmith said. “Dajiah is also just a very kind-hearted person in general, which is why I gave her the mom role.”

Once practices began, the group discovered they were four minutes under their time limit, so they decided to take advantage of it and add details.

“We get a time limit of 15 minutes at competitions,” Goldsmith said. “With the help of the girls, we added little details while making sure everyone had an equal part.” 

Strong performances at district and state competitions led the group to an excellent one rating at districts and a straight one rating at state

“Our judge at districts had nothing but good things to say about our performance,” Goldsmith said. “Verbal feedback wasn’t given at state, but we felt good about our performance.”

With state in the rearview mirror, the group awaited All-State announcements, but they would have to wait another day due to a competition being postponed in another part of the state.

“Having to wait until Monday was terrible because it was all I could think about all day, but adding on another day made it worse,” Jolley said. “Ashleigh Hartman and I were in and out of Goldsmith’s room all day the day announcements came out asking if she knew anything yet, but she didn’t.”

Late into the afternoon, group members learned they received an All-State performing nomination.

“I was very excited to hear we received a performing nomination,” Wegmann said. “We worked hard all season to make it.”

On the big stage of Stephens Auditorium, the girls made their last performance one of their best performances.

“Our All-State judge said a lot of good things about Daijah, specifically, and how she fit the mom role perfectly,” Goldsmith said. “Overall, he said our performance was really good.”

With a season full of fun moments and memories, Goldsmith said one moment stands out above all others when she watched her choral girls perform.

“I almost started bawling when I watched Lili (Shappell) running over to hug Dajiah for the first time,” Goldsmith said. “It was super cute.”

A week before All-State, the girls performed in front of their parents and speech teammates one final time before taking it to Ames. At the end of the night, Goldsmith invited the moms of the girls in the group up to the stage for a picture. 

“I hope this moment is a core memory that lasts forever, not only for the moms but for the girls as well,” Goldsmith said.