When church services ended, Mom led me to choir practice, held in the home of a neighbor.  The director was thrilled to have a new bass, and gave me a choir folder with my name on it, filled with favorites like Come Thou Fount of Every Blessing, Consider the Lilies, and John Rutter’s I Will Sing with the Spirit.  Mom was the ward choir director when I first started singing at the age of 12 in our New Jersey ward.  I learned from her so much about the beauty, complexity, and dynamics of choral singing and conducting.  She held this position for nine years.  In my forties, I was asked to direct the choir in my Utah ward.  I borrowed Mom’s choral music library, cleared the mental cobwebs, and put to work all the knowledge she taught me decades before.  At the same time, I sang in a wonderful Salt Lake City community choir, learning even more.  I have not sung with the church choir for a long time.  While choral singing can be uplifting and therapeutic, too much pain kept me away from people for too long.  I am happy to be singing again in the ward choir.  And as Mom expressed in choir practice today, “I am so grateful to be singing.”  Amen.