Helen Keller, the Later Years.

Everyone is familiar with the story of the early life of Helen Keller, but less known is the story of the rest of her life. There was the great breakthrough event of her childhood, which has been well publicized. Of course I’m referring to the moment at the well, when Helen recalled the word wa-wa from her early childhood. But there was a world of learning and wonderment that went far beyond that moment. Helen Keller mastered reading and writing, and wrote correspondence with a pencil which is hard to do for a blind person.

She traveled the country in her adult years, working hard to promote schooling for the deaf and blind and also putting on exhibits quite similar to the ones seen at circus side-shows, but in her teen and young adult years, Helen was quite a reader, devouring books at an incredible rate. She was a brilliant student and remembered everything she ever read, which caused some trouble in her childhood when she wrote her first short story, sent it to her former teacher at the blind/deaf school, and then discovered that the story she had written was actually a copy of someone else’s story of a similar title. This devastated Helen so much that she refused to write another story until her college years when she finally wrote her book, called, “The Story of My Life”.

Helen spoke five languages, and went to college at a time when American women simply did not go to college. She was a brilliant student even in that difficult environment, even though she required assistance with all of her professors’ lectures, and she mastered the art of lip reading. She had to read lips by placing her fingers on the speaker’s mouth, but was quite skilled at deciphering what was being said. Helen had exquisitely sensitive fingertips and could place her hand on the trunk of a tree and be able to tell if there was a bird resting in it or not. She could also tell if that bird was singing or not.

Helen never did re-acquire vision or hearing but she did manage to acquire verbal language and often spoke aloud on her tours of the country. She spoke, naturally, like a deaf person, lacking normal tone in her voice, but could speak in an understandable fashion. Her style of walking was a little more clumsy however, having acquired the habit of walking with both arms outstretched in front of her as a small child, she never outgrew that style of gait. Helen stayed with her original teacher, Annie Sullivan, until the older woman’s death, then she hired another assistant to help her with all her projects.

To me, Helen Keller represents all that is good about the human spirit. She was strong-willed and strong of heart as well, gifted of mind, though lacking in senses, Helen Keller lived a happy life, full of joy of the world and people around her. She knew many famous people in her day, and although she was more of an exhibit than anything else in most cases, she will forever be remembered by Americans young and old, for her bravery going through life with no eyes or ears. Helen was a beautiful woman, tall, blond, statuesque, and endearing to everyone who met her.

She is an inspiration to us all, not just to the hearing or sighted impaired but to everyone who ever wanted to strive to be something better. Helen never settled for just the ordinary, but was extraordinary in every way. She was a horse-woman, an author, a prolific letter writer, excellent student, world traveler, and able to decipher a person’s emotions just with a single touch alone. I know I can’t do that, so I feel inspired when I read more and more about this unique and incredible person.