This might explain why my tips weren’t so great

I was a very happy six-year-old any time Flo (that’s my mom) dropped me off at the library so she could run errands, and I was an absolutely elated six-year-old the night she dropped me off at the library, headed to the grocery store, drove straight home, pulled the car into the garage, put the groceries away and sat down with her feet up for a while before noticing how quiet it was.

Flo found me outside the library’s locked doors, smiling, sitting next to my pile of books, flipping through pages, anticipating which new book I’d start first. I was in seventh heaven.

That’s me in the middle, flanked by my sisters Bev and Marilee – they must not have gone to the library with me that night!

I met my dear friend Colleen ten years later. We were both waitressing at Marshall Field’s, saving our money for college. She says she knew I was cool right away when she saw me hide my paperback copy of Great Expectations in a pile of folded cloth napkins so I could sneak in a page or two between customers. Goes without saying. Colleen was a bookworm, too.

I lost my sight ten years later, in 1985. No iPhones, no digital recorders, no mp3 players, no laptop computers. Unabridged books on tape were hard to come by back then, and Braille was difficult to learn. How would I survive without being able to read? The National Library Service for the Blind and Physically Handicapped (NLS) came to my rescue. NLS mailed books and magazines on audio cassettes directly to our house at no cost, and now their books are available online for download.

The Daily Post reports that ebook sales recently trumped those of hardcover books. “The ease of digital books can’t be beat,” the post says. “How else can you hold hundreds of books in your hand so easily?” The post went on to admit that the sensation of reading a book by machine is undeniably different than cracking open a brand new book in print, and I have to agree. I’m grateful for technology for allowing me to keep up with my fellow bookworms, but if you want to know the truth, I do still miss cozying up in the corner of the couch to read words. In print. On paper. In a good, old-fashioned…book.

Better than match.com

Whitney and I had a ball at the Hamilton Branch of the Madison Public Librarylast Friday, and as always, the kids in the audience had some marvelous questions. My favorite one was

Whitney are becoming a good team.

this: “Your book says your Seeing Eye dog goes with you everywhere. Does she go in the shower with you, too?”

We’re heading to Champaign this Thursday To speak to an animal sciences class at the University of Illinois, and it’ll be interesting to find out if the kids in that college class read their texts as carefully as the little girl at that library in Madison did!

I plan on telling the college class what it’s been like transitioning to a new Seeing Eye dog, then going over some of the qualifications necessary to become a guide dog instructor. Most guide dog schools require instructors to have a college degree and then do an apprenticeship, and apprenticeships can last as long as four years. If I do a decent job explaining how complicated it can be to train dogs, train people, and then make a perfect match between the human and canine, the college kids might appreciate why the apprenticeships last so long.

Once apprentices finish their training and become full-time Seeing Eye Instructors, they’re assigned a string (a group) of dogs and given four months to train that string. Throughout the training, instructors pay close attention to each dog’s pace and pull, and they make careful notes about how each dog deals with distractions, what their energy level is, and all sorts of other characteristics. And then? We blind students fly in from all over North America to be matched – and trained — with a new dog.

Seeing Eye instructors have to be as good at evaluating people as they are evaluating dogs. Our instructors review our applications before we arrive on campus and then ask us tons more questions when we get there. Instructors take us on “Juno” walks (they hold the front of the harness to guide us through all sorts of scenarios to get an idea of how fast we like to walk and how strong of a pull we’ll want from our dog) and then combine all of this information with what they know about their string of dogs, talk it over with fellow instructors and the team supervisor, mix in a little bit of gut instinct, and voila! A match is formed.

Each Seeing Eye instructor trains more dogs than they’ll need for a class. If a dog has a pace, pull, or energy level that doesn’t match with a blind person in the current class, that dog remains on campus with daily walks and care, and perhaps more training, until the next class arrives. My first dog was one of those Seeing Eye dogs who went through a second round of training before she was matched with me. Back in 1991, the Seeing Eye knew that the dog they matched me with would be landing in the home of a very unique five-year-old boy named Gus, and that the dog would be in the hands of a woman who had never had a dog before. They must have figured Pandora would need all the extra training she could get!

Hanni was the perfect dog for everything going on during her years with me, Harper took a blow to save me from getting hit by a car on State Street. My fourth dog had big paws to fill, and it’s taken me a while to warm up to Whitney. Lately, though, I’m finally finding myself falling in love again.

My two-year-old Golden/Labrador Retriever cross is a hard worker who loves to play as much as she loves to work. Her curiosity gets her in trouble sometimes, but when she guides me down busy Chicago streets, she is directed, determined, and driven. The only time she lollygags? When she realizes we’re heading back home. She wants to go, go, go

Whitney’s confidence is contagious, and she’s smart enough to know when to bend the rules without getting in trouble. Hmm. Whitney and I just might make a perfect match after all.

When they come out with a new American Girl pub crawl doll, it’ll be named “Beth”

The Wisconsin Book Festival runs from November 8-11 this year and features Patricia McCormick (a finalist for the National Book Award), Pulitzer Prize winners Richard Russon and David Maraniss, Peabody Award Winner Ben Sidran, Guggenhei Felowship Award Winner Jo Ann Beard, Alex Award Winner Lynda Barry, and ASPCA Henry Berg Award Winner…ME!

The theme for this year’s fest is “Lost & Found,” and what a kick it was to discover who’d paired up to sponsor our session. From the  WBF Web Site:

HOW I LOST MY SIGHT AND FOUND MY WAY
BETH FINKE, “HANNI AND BETH: SAFE & SOUND” AND “LEND ME A PAW”
Fri, Nov. 9 | 3:30PM – 4:15PM
Hawthorne Branch Library
2707 E. Washington Ave., Madison, WI
(608) 246-4548
Sponsored by the Great Dane Pub and the American Girl Fund for Children

The Great Dane Pub makes sense (in more ways than one!), but American Girl? All I can figure is that their sponsorship stems from the set of service dogs-in-training American Girl started selling last summer to go with their uber-popular dolls. From the American Girl web site:

This sweet puppy is a service dog-in-training! He has soft fur, a solid body, and a collar. When it’s training time, your girl can slip on his service vest—it has a handle My American Girl® dolls can hold. Reward this special helper with faux treats for all of his good work!

Great Dane Pub is offering a free first pitcher of beer to any Festival author who comes in with a group during the Wisconsin Book Festival, but I don’t think I’ll ask all those kids to follow Pied Piper Whitney and me from the library to the pub for happy hour. If you’re anywhere near Madison, though, I hope you’ll join us. First pitcher is on me!

Happy Inter-dependence Day!

A lot of the conversation during The Q&A after my talk with Skokie Public Library’s Talking Books Book Club last week centered around independence.

Jim and Kathy Zartman.

After we shared tips for keeping track of our prescriptions, identifying colors of clothing, using talking computers to read and write, one senior citizen with macular degeneration piped up and said she loves to cook, but when her daughter offered to buy her a bag of frozen, chopped onions at the grocery store, she agreed to finally quit insisting on dicing them herself. “I’m learning to stop being so goddamned independent and accept help,” she said. “But it hasn’t been easy.” Her words were refreshing, and she didn’t have to be able to see to know we were all nodding in support.

Our hour at the library went by quickly, and once I’d thanked the Talking Books Book Club for having us, the dapper Jim Zartman guided Whitney and me to his car to take us home. I’ve known Jim for nearly a year now – his wife Kathy is in the memoir-writing class I teach at Lincoln Park Village. He drives Whitney and me to that class every Thursday, and when he found out I’d be speaking at Skokie Public Library last Wednesday, he volunteered to take me there, too.

Jim has the wisdom of age and the spirit of youth. During our rides the past year I’ve had the privilege of hearing his stories about growing up in a small town in Illinois, the mother who gave him his first violin, and getting free room and board in exchange for working as a houseboy for John Kenneth Galbraith’s family at Harvard. “They said they named their son Jamie after me,” he blushes. “But I’m not sure that’s true.”

Jim is not exactly forthcoming, but when I ask questions, he answers. In our 20-minute rides to class he’s shared the agony and ecstasy of raising children with Katherine, his appreciation for his talented grandchildren, his work writing the Illinois Power of Attorney Act and then getting it through the state legislature during his career as partner in the Chicago firm of Chapman and Cutler, and his current role as president of the board of the Chicago School of Violin Making.

The Chicago School of Violin making is one of only a handful of such schools in the world, and it happens to be located very close to the Skokie Public Library. “Would you like to stop at the school along the way for a tour? I would. We did. It was amazing.

Jessie Gilbert, a graduate of the school who specializes in bow-making now, led my one-on-one tour. Her sweet, strong hands guided me along blocks of maple and spruce that were to become instruments, and I met teachers and students who had come from all over the world to participate in the schools three-year program. Students aspire to the quality craftsmanship of the 17th and 18th century classical masters and are ready to enter the violin making and repair field as professionals once they graduate.

We couldn’t stay long — it wasn’t fair to distract the students from their work. While we were there, though, I was taken by how quiet the workspace was –no music to work by, just the intense sound of careful carving and fine sanding.

And so, after my rides and field trips with Jim, and hearing Kathy read her memoirs in class, I’m getting to know the Zartmans. Time to meet the grandchildren, now too! Skyler, Sonia and Aaron had all read my children’s book Hanni and Beth: Safe & Sound so they were eager to follow Whitney as she led me around their grandparent’s block. “You’re like the pied piper!” one of them exclaimed.

We sat in Zartman’s lovely back yard after our walk. I showed the kids how Braille works, then took Whitney’s harness off so she could play fetch with them. We all sat down together for a supper of Kathy’s home-cooked beef brisket afterwards. It was sublime.

On my Thursday rides to memoir-writing class with Jim, I often remind him that he doesn’t have to come each and every week. Whitney and I are capable of taking a bus to Lincoln park. He pretends he doesn’t hear, and you know what? That’s okay with me. Just like my new friend in the Talking Books Book Club, I’m learning to stop being so goddamned independent.

Helen Keller’s other life

When we set the date for my talk with a book group especially for blind readers yesterday, I don’t think any of us realized that the date we chose — June 27 — was Helen Keller’s birthday. What serendipity!

The story of Helen Keller’s childhood is well-known: an illness left her both blind and deaf as a child, and the day 20-year-old teacher Anne Sullivan managed to communicate the letters for “water” while running water from a pump on Helen’s hand was a breakthrough.

Most people know that Helen Keller grew up to become an advocate for people with disabilities. What many people don’t know, however, is that she became a radical activist along the way.

She joined the Socialist Party in 1909, when she was 29, and then the Industrial Workers of the World. She supported Communist Russia and hung a red flag over her desk. The FBI opened a file on her. She advocated for women’s suffrage and for access to birth control. She helped found the American Civil Liberties Union.

Through all that Helen Keller remained the darling of newspaper reporters and columnists, the amazing blind and deaf girl who talks with her hands. When she came out in support of Socialist Party candidate Eugene V. Debs in his campaign for the presidency, though, that was the last straw. Newspaper columnists who had earlier praised her courage and intelligence started calling attention to her disabilities.

One newspaper claimed “the poor little blind girl” was being exploited by the socialist party for publicity’s sake, and the editor of the Brooklyn Eagle wrote that Helen Keller’s “mistakes sprung out of the manifest limitations of her development.” No matter where you stand politically, I’m sure you can appreciate what a blow this must have been to Helen Keller. She had waited to formulate her opinion until after procuring and reading books about socialism in German Braille, and then asking a friend to come three times a week to spell articles from The National Socialist into her hand. From an Essay by Helen Keller:

She gives the titles of the articles and I tell her when to read on and when to omit. I have also had her read to me from the International Socialist Review articles the titles of which sounded promising. Manual spelling takes time. It is no easy and rapid thing to absorb through one’s fingers a book of 50,000 words on economics. But it is a pleasure, and one which I shall enjoy repeatedly until I have made myself acquainted with all the classic socialist authors.

Helen Keller responded to that Boston Eagle article and referred to a time she’d met the editor years earlier:

At that time the compliments he paid me were so generous that I blush to remember them. But now that I have come out for socialism he reminds me and the public that I am blind and deaf and especially liable to error. I must have shrunk in intelligence during the years since I met him…

All this reminds me that the personal attacks and general nastiness in our public discourse and politics is not new. Helen Keller was a saint until she ruffled feathers, and then she was limited intellectually. Instead of addressing her arguments, her critics took pains to discredit her, herself. It’s a reminder to me about my own views: whether I agree with her politics or not, I value the “poor little blind girl” for having the courage to express them, and express them well. I’d like to treat others with whom I might sometimes disagree the same way.

This little tale also reminded me that lots of folks who eventually came to be revered by the broader society — Martin Luther King, Jr., Eleanor Roosevelt, … heck, even Muhammad Ali … were reviled as marginal troublemakers and suffered hateful treatment in their own time. It’s a reminder that changing things has never been and will never be easy.

Discussion: the blind leading the blind

The book group I’m speaking to tomorrow is a bit different than other groups I’ve visited: the members are blind.

The Skokie Public Library established a Book Club especially for people with visual impairments over 25 years ago — it was part of the library’s commitment to give visually impaired patrons access to reading, and, later on, to technology.

For this month, Skokie’s Talking Books Book Club chose to read Long time, No See. My memoir is available for free in Braille or on audio to those who qualify for the Library of Congress National Library Service for the Blind and Physically Handicapped, and I’m expecting this audience to look, as it were, at my memoir with a different pair of eyes than other readers. Taking care of our son Gus when he was little? Struggling to find employment? Making mistakes like grinding pinto beans to make coffee? These anecdotes might be intriguing to sighted audiences, but I’m afraid they fall into the “been there, done that” category with tomorrow’s group.

Gary Gustin, the group leader, told me that the people who drive book club members to the library have started to participate in the book discussions now, too. “They used to just mill around the library while we were discussing our books, so we invited them to join us.” A number of drivers are married to the visually-impaired participants — maybe I’ll ask what they all think of the way Long time, No See deals with relationships. It’d be a totally selfish move on my part — I’ll learn far more from my audience than they’ll learn from me, and hey, I may gather enough material to write a sequel!

Art over adversity

I was extremely flattered when author and illustrator Sheila Welch asked me to participate in a book festival she was putting together in Freeport, Ill, and oh so disappointed to have to say no: Freeport is far away from Chicago and had no public transportation options. As you are about to find out from this guest post, Sheila Welch is one determined and resourceful woman, reluctant to take no for an answer. If my Seeing Eye dog Hanni and I took a commuter train as far west as it goes, she said she and her husband Eric could pick us up and drive us the rest of the way.

That car ride back in 2008 gave us a lot of time to talk, and we’ve stayed in touch ever since. I recently asked Sheila to write a guest post on what it’s been like to continue her career as an artist after being diagnosed with Parkinson’s Disease. No surprise here: she rose to the challenge.

The positively best therapy available for me

by Sheila K. Welch

The puzzling symptoms began a decade ago. In the fall of 2004, I had trouble autographing books. Strange. My mother could write her name with a flourish in her late 80s. I noticed, while drawing illustrations, certain movements were awkward and difficult. A few months later, I developed a slight tremor in my right hand.

“Waiting to Forget” is available at namelos press

My family doctor seemed confident that it was nothing serious, and I wanted to believe her. By the spring of 2007, however, waving, clapping, brushing my teeth, quick sketching, handwriting, and typing had all become either impossible or laborious tasks. I could sign my name, but only if I did it slowly and deliberately. And only if no one was watching.

Something was obviously wrong. I suspected Parkinson’s. My husband and I had a dear friend who’d had early onset Parkinson’s Disease (PD), so I was acquainted with this progressively debilitating condition. I went to a neurologist and he told me that I definitely had PD.

Living with Parkinson’s is a balancing act. Medications and exercises have been developed to control many of the symptoms. However, the medications alter brain chemistry and can result in nasty side effects such as extreme drowsiness, and, with prolonged usage, involuntary movements and psychosis.

My future looked bleak. Feeling myself losing abilities that had come naturally and easily for so long, I went into creative overdrive: I revised one novel manuscript. Wrote several stories. Finished revisions on a chapter book. Made illustrated dummy books.

Next I completed a novel that was close to my heart. Several of our children were adopted at school age, and they were the inspiration for WAITING TO FORGET, published by namelos in 2011. Kirkus Book Reviews describes it as “a poignant, realistic tale of child-survivors.” Bank Street College and Pennsylvania School Library Association have included it on their best-books-of-the-year lists.

While working with namelos to get WAITING TO FORGET published, I wrote a picture book manuscript and began sketching illustrations. On New Year’s Day last year, I resolved to work
on a memoir for my family. One hundred words a day added up to 36,500 by December 31.

This spring, I’m doing rough sketches for one of my manuscripts and working on a major revision of a novel. I also created two drawings for an exhibition appropriately called “Art over Adversity.”

While all of these projects take far longer than they would have before my Parkinson’s diagnosis, I’ve discovered that the creative process improves my mood, and that helps me feel better

Sheila’s painting “Dream Beach” was displayed at
the “Art over Adversity” exhibition for Parkinson’s awareness month.

physically. Stress exacerbates all the symptoms of Parkinson’s, but when I’m involved in illustrating a book or I’m writing a short story, the stress level drops.

Equally important: I’ve learned to modify and adapt. I still do presentations at schools and conferences, but I don’t do live demonstrations of my illustrations — I display a sketch I’ve brought from home. To avoid the stress of travel, I use Skype to interact with kids. When the local library hosted the launch of my novel, I offered pre-autographed books for sale.

I’m incredibly fortunate to have my husband Eric. He drives me everywhere, solves my computer issues, and does the household chores. With his help, I have the time and energy to be creative. Our seven children have all been super supportive. The youngest, whose early life was similar to that of my characters in WAITING TO FORGET, now lives in Texas. He has read the novel and tells me that it’s a “real, true” story, which is my most treasured review.

A few weeks ago, I began treatment with a more powerful medication for Parkinson’s disease, and now I can use my right hand to touch type. There’s talk in the PD world of a new medication that might be neuro-protective, but in the meantime, I will happily stick with the positively best therapy available for me — drawing and writing.

Love your library, love your librarians

Reports of libraries' demise have been greatly exaggerated (that's Chicago's Harold Washington Library, a few blocks from my home)

And now, some updates on librarians I admire who are marking the end of “Love Your Library” month by making big transitions.

• Karen Keninger. Karen is my fellow Seeing Eye graduate who is leaving her position as director of the Iowa Department for the Blind to become Director of the National Library Service for the Blind and Physically Handicapped. Karen is moving away from her familiar farm home in Iowa to take the new job. She is deciding between settling in a quiet place on the Metro line far enough away to escape busy DC, or embracing the urban environment and renting an apartment near her office. I have moved many times since losing my sight, but always under the guiding eyes of my husband Mike Knezovich. Karen is moving alone. Well, not completely alone – she’ll have her new Seeing Eye dog Jimi at her side. She wrote to say she’d be staying with friends in a Virginia suburb for a few weeks. “That way I can get my feet under me and figure out where I want to rent at first.” New job. New home. New town. New dog. New environment. New responsibilities. I admire Karen’s courage, and her dedication to the library service she loves.
• Mary Dempsey. With the city of Chicago’s entire public library system in transition, Mayor Rahm Emanuel is replacing longtime Library Commissioner Mary Dempsey with a technology-focused administrator from the San Francisco library system. Mary Dempsey holds a Master’s degree in library and Information Science from my alma mater, the University of Illinois, and it was a boost to my journalism confidence when editors at the Illinois alumni magazine asked me to interview her for a profile in 2001. Mary Dempsey oversaw the construction of dozens of new libraries during her tenure, but the Chicago Sun times reports that the 37-year-old technology guru who is replaicing her says it’s time to “re-envision what libraries look like, both in the physical space as well as in the digital space.”
• Stephanie Burke Bellucci. My young New Jersey friend Steph left her job as Library Director at the North Arlington Free Public Library this month to accept a position as Library Director at the Cliffside Park Free Public Library. Stephanie went to high school in Cliffside Park and is delighted to have the opportunity to
  Work for a library that has the familiarity of home.

When I told Stephanie I planned on publishing a post about Mary Dempsey being replaced by a technology guru, she told me that friends used to ask her if being a library director meant she got to read all day long. “Now they’re asking something even sillier,” she said. “They want to know if we still really need libraries.” Stephanie is not even 30 years old yet, and a lot of her personal philosophy about her vocation has to do with staying up to date with the most current technologies. She feels even more strongly about the importance of libraries as the cultural and social centers of their communities. “Just think about it,” she said. “Libraries offer help to job seekers, free internet access, story times, book clubs, discussion groups, author visits, free lectures and on and on. Libraries are much, much more than the books on their shelves.”

The American Library Association reports that library usage is up in the United States. “So how do I answer that silly question about whether or not we still need libraries?” Stephanie says. “With a resounding YES!”

Use your Mardi Gras voice

In my husband Mike Knezovich’s guest blog post about our trip to New Orleans last week, he described the “terrifyingly energetic” group of pre-schoolers who showed up to meet Whitney and me at the Latter branch of the New Orleans Public Library. What he forgot to mention was that a reporter from the New Orleans Times-Picayune showed up, too – along with a photographer!

Reporter Leigh Stewart had already interviewed me over the phone before Whitney and I arrived at the library, which was a good thing: she wouldn’t have gotten a word in at the event with all those curious kids there.

Valentine and I regale the kids.

From the Times-Picayune article:

At the library, Finke spoke to the children briefly, read a section of a Braille version of “Hanni and Beth” and invited the children to ask questions.

A class of sparkly-eyed kindergarteners from Morris Jeff Community School were among the most enthusiastic participants, asking questions such as “‘How do you know when to cross the street?” and “How does your dog know a good person from a bad person?” One youngster even asked all in attendance to quiet down, as he thought Whitney was trying to sneak a quick nap.

This boy’s schoolmates took him seriously, using ssuch hushed tones that their teachers had to encourage them to use their “Mardi Graas voices” so I could hear their questions. Kindergarten teacher Ashley Millet was quoted in the Times-Picayune story saying that their class is learning about rules and regulations, so our library visit made for a perfect field trip. “They get to see that even dogs have rules,” Millet said with a laugh.

I did emphasize rules in my talk with the kids, and after I told them the rule about not calling out Whitney’s name while she’s working, I suggested we come up with a fake name to use for her while we were there. “If you use her fake name to say hi to Whitney, she wont’ notice,” I said. “She’ll think you’re talking to someone else!”

The day of our visit was February 14, so I suggested we call her “Valentine.” All the kids loved the idea. Well, except for one. She raised her hand and objected. “It’s not nice to call names,” she said. Touché.

Contributing writer Leigh Stuart did a terrific job capturing the sweet spirit of the children in her Times-Picayune article, and if you link to the entire story online you can admire the pictures staff photographer Rusty Costanza took that day. From what Mike tells me, the photos are sweet, too!

Do you know what it means…

I asked Mike to give you an account of our most recent trip to New Orleans. Here’s Mike Knezovich:

It’s Fat Tuesday, and only a week ago, we were flying home from New Orleans. It feels like it’s been a long time already.

But I do remember…

We snagged our fair share of beads.

…catching three or four pre-Mardi Gras parades without even trying. And catching a whole lot of beads.

…a breakfast dish at Lüke restaurant called “eggs in a jar.” Two perfectly poached eggs, floating inside a jar on bernaise, with a fried softshell crab for a lid. Whoa.

…chandeliers and chandeliers and chandeliers and tapestries and extravagant crown molding and…chandeliers at our grand old hotel, Le Pavillon. And the hotel bartender, a German-born woman who landed in New Orleans decades ago and has been there since. And the hotel piano player, resplendent in a purple suit, who sang a lot like Nat King Cole.

Eggs in a jar. Can still taste that soft shell crab.

…multiply-pierced and tattooed young people playing old-time traditional jazz on the street. Superbly.

Panorama jazz band at The Spotted Cat.

…a great band at the Spotted Cat that we enjoyed for the price of a one-drink minimum.

…leaving the Spotted Cat, crossing Frenchmen Street to see John Boutte (Down in the Treme´,  just me and my baby…) at DBA.

…Riding the streetcar to the Latter Library, where Beth and Whit held court in front of a terrifyingly energetic group of pre-schoolers.

…dinner at Upperline. Go there.

…gumbo at Herbsaint. Go there.

I found a nice, safe, and quiet spot in the library with wireless while Beth and Whitney regaled the kids.

…a brass band, on our last night, playing just off Canal. They weren’t quite Rebirth Brass band, but they might be soon.

…walking. And walking. And walking. Just enough, the scale tells me, to have balanced off the caloric intake.

…dinner with our friends Seth and Bess, who moved to New Orleans from our Chicago neighborhood almost two years ago now. They are a wonderful young couple, who — it’s somewhat bittersweet to say — are plainly as happy as clams in New Orleans, so much so that it’s hard to imagine them back in Chicago.

So, how was New Orleans?

Sublime.

And I can say, having been there countless times, that while we always leave New Orleans, New Orleans never leaves us.