I was watching an old episode of “Little House On The Prairie” this afternoon. My thoughts went out to people who became or was born blind. Mary, in that episode, became blind. She had to go to a school in order for her to live a good life, but I know many who haven’t had that schooling yet they live graciously and happily, never grumbling about their infirmity. The first one, and I don’t even know her name, was sitting in a chair in my doctor’s office. I didn’t know she was blind until I saw she was reading a brail book.I sat down beside her and asked her what she was reading. She smiled and said “This book is a magazine, Women’s Day. There is a lot of good articles in it.”

I began looking for her at the doctor’s office. She told me she lives alone. That shook me a little and I asked her how she gets where she wants to go and she told me with a smile on her face. She said,”I’m so thankful for C- Tran. The bus takes me where I want to go and then comes to get me.” I guess this is the time to raise our hands in praise that our city offers this to people who are handicapped.

The second one I want to tell you about is a man with a beautiful tenor voice. I was the choir director and heard his voice somewhere in the church. I tried to find him but no one had seen him. One day he found me after church. I, of course, didn’t know he was the man I was looking for. He asked me if he could join the choir. I wondered how he could handle the music, but I asked him to come and told him when we met. He came with his wife, a small cassette, paper and pen.And I can tell you he learned the anthems before any of the other men in the choir. He copied the tenor part on his cassette and his wife wrote the words of each anthem, and they must have had a grand time at home. He, certainly did not let this blindness stop him!

But the most important person I want to write about is my grandma. She became blind the same year I was born. She often joked that she didn’t want to see me. That’s why she got blind. She was alone during the day as her daughters worked at a women’s wear store. but she worked at home and knew what time she should start dinner. She watched “Ma Perkins” and some other soap operas too. And she was a faithful listener to “The Grand Forks Chiefs” never missing a game. She knit mufflers for any boy in town she heard about and was the “Mother of the year” for the city a couple of times. The armed service band came to her house twice and played for her. She was an amazing women.

And so it seems the blind people have something that seeing  people don’t have. Maybe we should learn what it is and add it to our lives, don’t you think?

I was going through some of my old text books and papers from a long ago college writing class and came upon a story I had written and I thought you might like the story too.

Bobby was a little boy in my Sunday School class. He was swinging a little too high on a swing close to our house and he fell off the swing and hit his head on a rusty tomato can. We weren’t as careful about getting rid of things as we are today! Someone came by and  saw him lying on the ground. It seems a bit strange that he was all alone at the time he fell as he was only four years old. He was taken to a hospital in the next town. There was no hospital in our little town, and, as I think about it now, I don’t think we had a doctor in town either! After a few days, Bobby died.

I don’t know how it came about but I was asked to sing for his funeral. I was only four years old too! I don’t even know how it came about but I wore a white dress, white stockings and white shoes! I never had such beautiful clothes. Mama must have borrowed them but I surely remember wearing them that day, and I remember standing up in front of the church filled with people ready to sing “In the Sweet By and By” which I had been practicing at home. This wasn’t home though, and I was scared. I was glad that Mama was at the organ that day.

I started to sing and the people started to cry! I imagine there were many people not crying, but it seemed to me that everyone was crying and I didn’t know what to do! I must be singing very bad, I thought. I sort of slid over  to the organ and I whispered to Mama,”should I quit singing? I made everyone cry.” Mama smiled at me and whispered “keep on singing, You are doing so well.”

So I finished the song and then ran out of  the church. Later, I asked Mama “Why did all the people cry when I was singing?” Mama answered,”Because you were singing so well. When you sing, always sing the words of a song clearly. You were doing that and the words went straight to their hearts and they were sad thinking about Bobby.”

Though I sang that song over eighty years ago I’ll never forget it, nor will I forget what Mama said. I have sung hundreds of songs since that day and I always sing the words clearly. Lately I have heard songs that don’t seem to have any words in them, just gibberish. What good is that to anyone who really needs a song?