Helen Keller by Kathleen V. Kudlinski

Author:Kathleen V. Kudlinski
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: Penguin Young Readers Group
Published: 2010-03-01T00:00:00+00:00

4

On Her Own

John Macy often came to Helen and Teacher’s house in Wrentham. He fixed a walking path for Helen with a rope fence that she could follow alone. He built extra bookcases for Helen’s Braille books. He went with Helen and Annie to a giant national fair held in St. Louis in 1904.

That same week, a big meeting of teachers of the blind and the deaf was also held in St. Louis. The fair had a Helen Keller Day to honor Teacher and her famous student.

Crowds followed Helen wherever she went. They even took the flowers off her hat to help them remember their meeting with the wonderful woman. It showed Helen how much people cared about her, what she had done, and what she had to say.

Soon after they returned to Wrentham, John and Annie had something to say to Helen. They had decided to be married! Annie told her that she would never leave her side. John would move into the house with them. He could work there on his own books and poetry and still help Helen with her writing.

Helen was working on another book about herself, called The World I Live In. She would have liked to write about something else for a change. But her fans wanted to know still more about her life.

She was often asked how she could write about colors when she couldn’t remember ever seeing them. Helen explained that when she said pink, she imagined rosebuds; green was young plants. She thought of red as warmth. Blue meant great open spaces to Helen and purple made her think of strong, deep feelings. Yellow stood for joy and sweet, warm sunlight.

“How can you tell if it is day or night?” was another common question. Helen said that the air felt lighter to her in the day. Smells were fainter, too. She could feel more breezes in the air and bouncing in the ground as people passed by with their horses and carriages.

Besides writing books and articles, Helen was making money by giving speeches. The groups of people who hired her listened quietly. Even so, Annie still had to repeat most of what Helen said. Her student’s voice moved from loud to soft, from squeaky to deep, and from scratchy to slurred—often all in the same sentence. Helen’s voice may have been awful, but her message was always joyful and cheerful.

In a magazine article, she wrote to girls, “Be happy. Talk happiness. There is enough sadness in the world without yours.” Helen was about to try to end some of that sadness. In her next book, Out of the Dark, she finally wrote about something besides herself. It was about solving the problems of the world of 1913: hunger, poor housing, lack of jobs, and cruelty. Few Americans liked this book, for her answers to the problems would mean more taxes for everyone. Helen also wanted women to be able to vote. Few men liked this idea. She wanted the United States to stay out of any wars, although in 1913 a dangerous war had already started.

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