What do you do in the face of adversity? You face it.

This evening our Shalom Club was treated to a very special performance by the Tremble Clefs West Side Choir.  Yes, the Tremble Clefs because these are singers who Tremble due to Parkinson's Disease, a degenerative disease affecting an additional 60,000 people in the US each year.  At this time there is no cure.  But there is treatment for those who seek it out, and Tremble Clefs is one of the treatments. 
One of our members, Fred Cohn, faced his diagnosis head on.  There's scarcely a day when I'm out and about in the community that I don't see Fred at the gym, in the clubhouse, walking down the street sun hat on, water bottle in hand.  He is courageous and he brought the Tremble Clefs to us.  One of the degenerative features of Parkinson's is the loss of muscles which flatten out the expression from your face, and may eventually silence your vocal muscles.  Fred is fighting back, as are the other 74 members of the west side Tremble Clef Choir, an offshoot of the Mohammed Ali Parkinson's Institute in Phoenix.
I was very moved by the performance, by the courage of the members to show up in their lives, to fight back, to face the adversity which they each know will eventually overtake them--it's a question of time.  Although their voices sometimes cracked, and some words were indistinct, the enthusiasm of the choir members and their Korean leader/therapist inspired me.  Would I stand up and put myself out?  Would you? 
We can go through life finding joy where we can, or we can bemoan all we don't have or can't do?  Which do I want to be, because it is a choice.  Embrace every day, so trite and so true. 

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