She yearns to hear the howls of Aerosmith, Kiss, U2 and Tom Petty. Arlo Guthrie's tenor, Beyonce's soprano, Eric Clapton's guitar and Anoushka Shankar's sitar. Justin Bieber's teen bop and Julia Nunes' folk pop.
She's not into musicals, but she'd make an exception for the aural thrills of "Avenue Q" and "Hair."
And while she's at it, if she could afford it, she'd hit the comedy clubs every night, to revel in exquisitely delivered punch lines and the happy noise of the communal laughter that follows.
"I'll be honest, the thought of going deaf scares the living daylights out of me," says Kristen. "I'd rather lose my eyesight than my hearing. When you hear things, it creates images in your mind - you can still 'see.'
"But when I lose my hearing, I won't be able to hear my mom say my name anymore. I won't hear my nephew and nieces tell me they love me."
And she won't hear music, except in memory.
So, with the help of her mom - "She's trying to make all my sound dreams come true," says Kristen - she is on a mission to hear as much of it as she can, while she can.
It's a cruelly ironic fate for Kristen - a musician and speech-communications major who is crazy for sound.
"I had ringing in my ears almost my whole life," says Kristen, a bubbly, dark-eyed, curly-haired sophomore at Montgomery County Community College and part-time cashier at Whole Foods in Plymouth Meeting. "I didn't know it was abnormal until I got my diagnosis."
Kristen is sitting in the East Norriton apartment she shares with her mom, Karen D'Antonio, and their two cats. Her dad died of esophageal cancer when she was 14. Her two married sisters live nearby with their families.
