Helen was on cloud duty when we brought Ev home the other day.

Helen likes to make it clear that she is not just Ethan's godmother, so to speak. She loves them all and she loves that we can have the conversations that we have on the road and in the house.

It looked like she had worked some of the wood carving that Evvy had in school, because the sprawl that she usually scribbles were perfectly formed block letters, as if on a line. She set up a board, very much like the board that I have for the babies to talk about the weather, in my class. LIFE and then a big tree, like the trees that I have on my board and the two of us lying underneath looking up at the tree, like little girls. So now I know that she doesn't call it the tree of life, but LIFE Tree. That is our new code, when she has cloud duty. Don't lose focus on that, she said. One thing is in our view, LIFE tree or tree of life, on my side.

"Now we see through a glass darkly..."

Whenever I see that beautiful cinematography that was part of the beginning of "the Miracle Worker"movie, years and years ago, I think of that verse in the Bible.

Now we see through a glass darkly...1 Corinthians 13:12

How many questions the story of Helen Keller evokes? Why would God allow suffering? How could a human mind overcome those huge impediments? What love that a mother has to search the world for the right instruction for her child?

God loves us, His Church more! More than Mother Keller, more than Annie Sullivan, more than America loved Helen, God loves His Church. He is guiding us and teaching us and holding us and cleaning us up.

That Is Not Fiction!

My seeing Helen everywhere I go is.

I didn't expect the whole crew...

I had sensed some interesting spiritual activity going on around the house. Truly, I was praying and sensing some sort of surprise brewing. It is usually, Helen. So, I have come to expect the unexpected here and there. This was certainly of a different sort. Shadows and alerts here and there. My soul seemed a bit more calm, when it should be alarmed. These shadows didn't scare me and I couldn't have guessed what they were up to at all. Things like this are like reflexes. They happen all of a sudden, but they seem to take alot of time in prep and in absorbing. I really think that the elder people who have gone before meet here, before they go to NY for special occasions from Heaven. I know Netty is ripe with child, so I can only imagine that this is why they came to me. It is always special, but I think that they were telling me that fellowship with Heaven is not once in a lifetime, as I assumed, but a perk of communion with God. I said to myself that this is something that will happen and be over with, or maybe it means that I am not long for this earth. Well, in anycase, the night seemed so very long. I was aware of the Valentine theme around the house more than usual. We are all lovydovy around here and the sight of the children making Valentine's for Ezra's class was a beautiful sight. I slept and then awoke a few times. Ben gave me a long discussion that was about this and that. I didn't fall asleep once,{prodded by the convicting sermon that I heard by Pastor Stu}. I think he was even surprised that I didn't fall asleep he talked so long. Then when I slept I dreamed a very pictoral dream about the angels and up and down from heaven. I said that I would remember, but when I opened my eyes it was spiritually decorated all around me. Shadows and lights and darks, like being on the inside of a snowflake. I know Helen and baby Ben were there, Grandma Ruth, Aunt RaRa and Aunt Iva, who else, I don't know, but they were all around the room and it was dark and light at the same time. The angel that wakes me to prayer and praise, seemed nowhere around this morning. I got up and went to prayer and God is always there, who is more special than the most special guests who might come by, every once in a while.

Helen always comes with me to the children's concerts.

She is a delightful companion at these events where there are too many people and I get so very nervous in crowds. She points out the interesting things around, me that I would miss if she weren't with me. Last year she showed me how she dances to the African drums and I nearly fell off my chair with laughter, to imagine her dancing around me as she did. This year, she pointed out the flags on the ceiling, which I never would have noticed. She got right up on the stage with those children and danced to Santa Clause is coming to town. Last year she was comforting me, so she couldn't go up on the stage. This year she knows that I won't fall off the chair so easily, so she left me for a minute or two to enjoy the spotlight with the children. There were so many little people in the audience and she especially loves the chopsticks song. I don't know why she loves that song so much, she doesn't let me ask her too many questions, she just does. My son in the concert is my complete entertainment and I would miss all of the other enjoyments about me, had I not a friend who points these other things out.

Now We See as through a glass darkly---(The opening scene from the "Miracle Worker")

God's love expressed in this hymn spoke to my heart so well. Bless the Lord!

Sooner Than we could know!

The darkness of the storm was alarming. I wasn't ready for the emotions of the moment. I guess, I felt that fellowship with Helen was a right of this era of the church history. I hadn't learned Braille yet. I just enjoyed being able to see her perspective on the things around me. Then, the lightning struck. She was gone. In her place was a picture in the sky. It was a face with a half smile. Her face is on the glass at the bottom of heaven, looking for me, in my imagination. The smile was not a full smile. She said the smile in this time is going from frown to half smile. We can't ever know what great fellowship there is with those whose rest is won. But, just a taste, makes me hungry for Heaven. The oven rang and the lightning flashed and I knew that she was in empathy to my plight upon earth. I have sight, I have hearing and speech, which she had none, while she was on earth. It seemed that the lesson was that God weaves our expectations, even, into His paroucia. As though we are rowing to Christ's appearing and He is commanding the procession in the understanding of our wondrous expectation. It was very sudden, although completely expected. Do we expect Him? Do we pray and prepare? He could come, without our being ready, but His heart is for His church's preparation. For Her, He labors in intercession and advocacy and in direction of Heaven and Earth, which He is Lord of. The memories of my friend Helen, representing Grandma Monica at Ethan's concert and the other moments of intense fellowship were crescendoed in one lightning flash. Don't forget, Christ will come, just as quickly. Don't forget, you're not stupid, if you don't know Braille. And our faces kissed at the bottom of heaven. You keep your lips like this, not a full smile, until Christ appears. He is the payment for our salvation. She knew it and I knew it. So many questions unanswered. So many things we never said to eachother, but, friendship with Jesus uniting us.

Who's the Miracle Worker?

The first scene in the Miracle Worker, 1962 there was a reflection in a Christmas bulb and in my mind I hear the verse- "Now, we see through a glass darkly..." If there were anyone who saw through a glass darkly and whose life transformed the darkness and made sense out of a difficult providence it was Helen, to my mind. I see her, through my readings about her and the wondrous actresses who have depicted the writings about her life. I love her. I imagine that, if anyone would be assigned to instruct the Church to see God's providences on the earth and the workings of God in His love of His Church, it would be Helen. God, Like Annie Sullivan attempts and continues to attempt to civilize us from our self-will and blind indifference to our sin and shame and the Church, we, like Helen through spoons on the ground and fight against goodness and love, for our own way. We don't know. We can't see the Higher plan. We can't know what our sin is doing to God's heart. He is patient and kind and guiding us

Helen said goodbye this morning...

It was set in Braille. Clearly set dots on the arms of the chairs, outside my back door, from the morning dew, was a special message. I said, Helen, you know that I don't read Braille. She said, I guess that makes you stupid, as well as blind, deaf and dumb. We both giggled at the mutuality of that thought. I promised to try to learn Braille and she promised to send me imaginative conversation, in mystic sweet communion. Mostly, my imagination, but delightful to have gotten to know her humorous self. I must say she is so very funny. I never would have thought so. I shall have to attempt to find facts and biography her, if I have a moment to.
I felt our hearts were knit and that when I get to heaven, I will have a friend already there.