PETERBOROUGH — Betty Coffin Brooks hasn’t missed a Monadnock Chorus concert since she joined the group 10 years ago, and she doesn’t intend to miss one now.

“I’ve never missed a concert before. It’s definitely important to me,” Brooks told the Monadnock Ledger-Transcript in a phone interview from her bed at Harris Hill Center in Concord on Friday.

On Nov. 4, Brooks survived a head-on collision on Route 202 North that claimed the life of a Bennington man.

Patrick J. Sanders, 46, of Onset Road, Bennington, was pronounced dead at the scene.
Brooks, 63, of Turner Hill Road, Antrim, was taken to Monadnock Community Hospital with serious injuries. She was later airlifted to U-Mass Medical Center in Worcester Mass., where she was treated for two breaks and one fracture in her left leg. She was moved from U-Mass to the Concord rehabilitation center on Nov. 11.

On Friday, Brooks said she is healing well. “It’s been going really good,” she said. “I think I’m going to be singing with the chorus on Dec. 13.”

The Monadnock Chorus winter concert, “A Baroque Christmas,” has two dates, the 12 and the 13, but Brooks said she plans to pace herself and will only attempt to sing at the Sunday afternoon concert.

“I’m trying to be reasonable and rational about what I can do,” Brooks said.
Especially since she found Thanksgivings Day dinner at her parents’ Bennington home so fatiguing. “It was exhausting to sit at the table and talk to my family.”

Thanksgiving was also her first day on crutches after graduating from a wheelchair to a walker, she said. Her left leg was recently taken out of a full leg cast and placed in a fracture brace, she said. “I’m thrilled to be out of a wheelchair and in a walker.”

Brooks spends a couple of hours a day in physical therapy, she said. Harris Hill Center also has recreational activities for residents. “Most of the people here are like me, struggling to stand up with a walker.”

The staff is wonderful, she said. “Everyone is smiley and encouraging.”
While her right foot is not broken, it is not easy to walk on it. The tendons were badly bruised in the crash, she said. Because of that, she has to put ice on her right foot after she walks on it.

Using a walker or crutches takes a lot of concentration and is tiring, she said. “It’s going to be a while before I’m walking on it,” she said of her broken left leg.

Brooks said she is focused on her recovery and has a positive outlook. There are always challenges in life, she said, so why get frustrated. “It’s a challenge,” she admitted. “But if you look at life like it’s frustrating your going to be a very miserable person. ... It’s a microcosm. You really have to look at what is the next step.”

For now, she is happy to be able to brush her teeth, dress and bathe herself. “You really have to look at the bright side,” she said. “Everything is getting better. It’s just a matter of steps, small steps.”

Since the accident, Brooks said she has received “a million cards and letters. ... I didn’t realize I had so many friends.”

Brooks, who moved to the area from Boston in 1981, said she loves living in a small town. “It’s like having one big family. ... My town librarian came in and brought me books.”
Brooks had been on her way to Monadnock Choir rehearsal at the time of the crash. As rehearsal manager, Brooks is in charge of setting up the chairs and breaking them down afterward.

“She’s one of those people who’s a server and when they are gone you see what a big hole they leave,” chorus director Jim Sharrock said Monday.

All the choristers are extremely grateful she survived the crash, is doing so well and look forward to her return, he said. “She’s always there with a big smile and she’s a doer.”
Sharrock said a chorus member is recording a rehearsal this week to take to Brooks so she can practice and prepare for the concert.

“We had practice CDs to begin with, but I think mine got cut up in the truck,” Brooks said.
Singing with the chorus is always such an uplifting experience for her. Even if she goes to a rehearsal with a headache, she lives on top of the world, she said. Focusing on the concert is just one of her goals for her healing. “It would not kill me to miss it. I would hate to miss is,” she said of the chorus concert.

Brooks said her ultimate goal is to dance again with her husband, David Brooks. “I’m not going to stop at walking, I want to dance.”

Brooks founded, directed and taught at the Small Beginnings School and daycare center in Bennington for 24 years. The school closed two years ago. Since then she has been working as a substitute teacher for the ConVal School District.

According to police, the crash occurred Nov. 4 at approximately 6:55 p.m. just south of the intersection of routes 202 and 136.

Police determined that the northbound 1995 Subaru Legacy Sanders was driving crossed the centerline into the path of the southbound 2004 Toyota pickup truck, driven by Brooks. Last week Police Chief Scott Guinard said the reason the Subaru crossed the centerline remains a mystery.