Yesterday, I visited the house where you were born. And I got chills.

I’ve chased you all over the US. I visited your grave in the Washington National Cathedral, I got chills there, too. I performed in a historic theater where you once lectured. Chills. I drove past the house where you died in Connecticut. Chills.

You see, I don’t have many heroes. I dislike the idea of personal idols. I have always felt that if you put someone on a pedestal it’s not fair to them, and it’s doubly unfair to yourself.

Because you can never measure up to an idol. Once you idealize someone you have degraded yourself. You have made the beautiful unattainable.

No matter how hard a man tries, his idol will always be “smarter,” “more exceptional,” or “better-looking.” All chances for growth diminish beneath the poisonous drug of comparison.

But you were no idol. You were never on a pedestal. You were always down here amongst us sinners. Groping your way through your own inner darkness and silence.

You never had children, but you were maternal to me. I read your books as a young man, fatherless and lost, ignorant and uneducated, the victim of paternal suicide and I would imagine that you were my grandmother, sharing nuggets of wisdom only with me.

You were an artist whose medium was the English language. Your words were balm to me. And still are.

You once said: “We can decide to let our trials crush us, or we can convert them into forces for good.”

And: “Relationships are like Rome — difficult to start out, incredible during the prosperity of the ‘golden age’, and unbearable during the fall. Then, a new kingdom will come along and the whole process will repeat itself until you come across a kingdom like Egypt… that thrives, and continues to flourish. This kingdom will become your best friend, your soul mate, and your love.”

And you said: “So long as you can sweeten another’s pain, life is not in vain.”

And my favorite:

“I believe that God is in me as the sun is in the colour and fragrance of a flower—the Light in my darkness, the Voice in my silence.”

So, I walked along the floorboards where your little feet once trod. I strolled beneath the groves where you played during your girlhood.

I am afraid to say that I have fallen in love with you. I wish I could talk with you. I wish you were around so that we could be friends.

But if you were here, I would’ve had to get in line. For everyone loved you. You traveled to 39 different countries on five continents. You were fluent in five languages. Mark Twain, your close friend, called you the “Eighth Wonder of the World.”

You met 12 standing presidents. You are the only reason there is a standardized system of Braille in this country. Some say you are the reason we have audiobooks.

Audiences would swarm you. You visited Hiroshima and Nagasaki after the nuclear bomb fell; you held blind babies who were dying of radiation poisoning.

You visited India, where they say you embraced the untouchables. You held deaf beggars in your arms and caressed their faces.

I don’t know why I’m writing to you. Except to say that although I never knew you, I still miss you.

Before I left your home in Tuscumbia, Alabama, I stood in the doorway of your bedroom in silence. And I tried to imagine you as a little girl on your childhood minister friend’s knee, when he spoke words which, as you said in your memoirs, altered the course of your life in 1890. He was the same minister who wrote “O Little Town of Bethlehem.” He said to you:

“There is one universal religion, Helen, the religion of love. Love your Heavenly Father with your whole heart and soul, love every child of God as much as ever you can… and you have the key to Heaven.”

And you responded by placing your little hand in his, and finger-spelling into his palm. You said:

“I always knew he was there, but I never knew his name!”

Well, He knew yours. And thanks to Him, so do we. Thank you, Helen Keller.

Give Anne and Polly my best.

Lovingly your friend,

—Sean Dietrich