HAM LAKE, Minn. — Could there be anything sadder than the silent piano of a pianist, robbed of her ability to play?
“Yep, that’s life,” Linda Dieken says with her usual positivity. “Everybody has something, so, it’ll be okay.”
Linda has ALS.
“These two,” says Linda, pointing at her fingers. “I can’t get them to move.”
Paralysis and spasms have taken from Linda one of her greatest joys, time spent playing the baby grand piano that sits idly in her living room.
Linda points to the three CDs she’s recorded. She mentions concerts and years spent playing the piano at her church.
On good days, she can still make it though her favorite song.
“I used to do it a lot better,” Linda says apologetically.
She pauses between notes to recite the song’s lyrics. “I will rise when he calls my name. No more sorrow, no more pain.”
It’s the song Linda has selected for her funeral.
“I know where I’m going,” she says. “I get to go to heaven.”
Still, the weight of Linda’s losses is sometimes too much for her husband, Al.
As Linda plays, a tear rolls down Al's cheek.
“I’ve had a concert every day for 20 years,” he says, “and I’m going to miss that.”
But Al and Linda are not the only ones with trouble.
“See the cracking along the side,” Daniel 'TJ' Simmons, a Salvation Army captain, says, as he stands next to the baby grand piano that used to occupy the chapel at the Noble Worship and Service Center in Brooklyn Park.
In November of 2022, an arsonist set fire to a pile of donated coats, setting off sprinklers that warped the piano’s soundboard.
“It’s enough where it’s not repairable,” the captain says.
Which is why a truck, with two piano movers, is pulling into Linda and Al’s driveway.
“Gets to go to its new home,” Linda says, as the movers begin prepping her piano for transport.
Linda believes it was meant to be.
She points to a stack of certificates on a small table.
“This is all the awards my dad got for ringing the bell for the Salvation Army,” she says.
Glen Doty never missed a Christmas season ringing bells.
“He was on his own when he was 14," Linda says, “so I think he knew what it was like to go through hardships.”
Linda learned on the news about the Salvation Army’s water-damaged piano.
“I knew,” she says, “that was God’s plan to give this piano to them.”
“We’re grateful to her,” Captain Simmons says, as the movers set up Linda’s donated piano in the chapel.
Days later, the piano is used for the first time.
Newly tuned for the Salvation Army’s annual Lucia Fest, the piano beautifully accompanies the children’s pageant, including a stirring rendition of Silent Night.
Linda sits with Al in a pew near the front. She is beaming.
“I’m very happy,” she says. “This is where it belonged.”
ALS has already taken much of Linda.
But this Christmas, Linda is better defined by what she has left – to give.
Boyd Huppert is always looking for great stories to share in the Land of 10,000 Stories! Send us your suggestions by filling out this form.
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