Column | Melancholy

My wife is one of those people with dementia who likes to move to music. She entirely absorbs in it, spontaneously comes up with her own choreography and swings, with or without other PA Tients, over the dance floor.

She has moved to another nursing home where more activities take place, such as small classical concerts and theme afternoons, dedicated to older pop music. Recently it was the turn of The Rolling Stones and The Beatles. I was allowed to enjoy, which I already succeeded in the sight of the patients in Rolling chairs in the front row at The Rolling Stones. One of them, a very old lady, started singing immediately upon entering: « I can’t get no … satisfaction! »

The careers of these bands were discussed in a nutshell on the basis of their best -known hits. Volunteers handed out textbooks, the music crashed through the room and a suitable video of the band was shown with each song. Most patients were quietly, but listening carefully. On the afternoon dedicated to The Beatles, I was again impressed by all those great songs that I had not heard for so long. « Do you like it too? » I asked a young volunteer. « Yes, but I wouldn’t set it up myself, » she smiled.

What I particularly noticed was the nostalgia with which many of those songs are penetrated.

Eleanor Rigby: All the Lonely People/ Where do they all come from?/ All the lonely people/ Where do they All Belong?

A very old lady started singing immediately upon arrival: « I can’t get no … satisfaction »

Let is be: when I find myself in Times of Trouble/ Mother Mary Comes to ME/ Speaking Words of Wisdom, Let it be. « 

The Long and Winding Road: Many Times I’ve Been Alone/ And Many Times I’ve Cried/ Anyway, You’ll Never Know/ The Many Ways I’ve Tried.

And, of course, Yesterday, The most covered song ever: Yesterday, all my troubles seemed so far away/ now it looks as though they’re here to stay/ oh i believe in Yesterday. How young was Paul McCartney when he came up with all that melancholy? Less than 23.

I looked at the patients in the room. Most seemed to me by the melancholy, because without memory no nostalgia. The melancholy was for the family members.

I was reminded of my wife’s first nursing home where she spent half a year. In the last period there was a new resident, a man, John, who was about ten younger years than she was. John always visited her and she was patiently leaning on his love. They were constantly talking to each other, « in their own language, » as the carers called it.

On the day of the move, they did not say goodbye to each other, because neither of them realized what was about to happen. The next day my wife completely surrendered to her new environment, she was completely forgotten John and her former home. I had to think about him, I was sorry that we had to do this to him.

When I went to pick up some forgotten things in the home a few days later, I asked him. Yes, a caretaker said, he had been in vain for her door for a while. I saw the painful scene in front of me, as if it had happened to me – but luckily it is not that far yet.

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