Oh, What a Beautiful Morning

A pair of writers from the memoir-writing classes I lead for The Village Chicago appeared on the national NBC Nightly News broadcast last weekend. Bruce and Anne Hunt started taking memoir-writing classes with me years ago, and now they’re taking singing lessons, too.

My friend Colleen and I went to their choir’s holiday concert in December, and I am over the moon that NBC saw fit to share the story of this amazing group of singers with the nation last week. I’ll let Bruce explain.

Good Memories

by Bruce Hunt

Except for those spontaneous protest songs in the sixties, neither of us has sung in a choir since high school. But when Anne was diagnosed with Alzheimer’s disease in April of 2016, we wanted to do all we could to hold off the advancement of the cruel illness.

You can watch the NBC News segment that features Anne and Bruce Hunt online.

We read about it. We studied the research. We joined support groups at the Alzheimer’s Association, and we started singing with the Good Memories Choir — a musical group made up of folks with early stages of memory loss, their care partners and volunteers who want to make a contribution.

We practice every Tuesday at 9:30 in the morning, and each rehearsal begins when the choir stands (as we are able) for a rousing rendition of “Oh What a Beautiful Morning.” We move so as to demonstrate that the corn is as high as an elephant’s eye, and the sound really is rich. That’s how we get started.

Anne and I had heard that learning a new skill was good discipline for people 65 and better, and we’d also heard that music has a remarkable impact on brain functioning. What we did not expect was how much fun it would be to sing with thirty or so new colleagues, nor did we realize what hard work it would be to practice for one and a half hours every week.

But Jonathan Miller, our choirmaster, and his wife Sandy establish a climate that is joyful and upbeat. And guess what? Anne and I turned out to be more capable singers than we thought we were. The spirit of the choir and the Millers’ leadership come through in this brief excerpt from the NBC Nightly news.

In addition to the choir, we have some other resources going for us. We have been married for 62 years and we have navigated some pretty rough terrain along the way. We have three daughters and five grandchildren who have all signed on to be part of the care team. In fact we have a whole Village (The Village Chicago) surrounding us as a community of support.

For years we have been part of Beth Finke’s memoir writing class, sponsored by Village Chicago, which means we have captured our experience; we have recorded our unique history.

When we were in separate writing groups responding to the same prompts, Beth once said of us: “It was like listening to a love story in stereo.” We treasure that image.

Now we understand our mission, our present calling: to tell our story, to demystify Alzheimer’s, to demonstrate as best we can for as long as we can that there is life beyond the initial diagnosis. For us, the notion of living one day at a time takes on fresh meaning, not that we quit planning, but that we do seize the day we have been given, avoid regret over past opportunities missed, or fantasizing about impossible futures. We try to be present for each other and for others in our world.

Right now, music is key. We are committed to the weekly practice, and we are driving toward the next big concert in May.