I found light and joy at the same moment, and I can say without hesitation that from that time on light and joy have never been separated in my experience. I have had them or lost them together. I was not light myself, I knew that, but I bathed in it as an element which blindness had suddenly brought much closer. I could feel the light rising, spreading, giving form. Since it was not I who was making the light, since it came to me from the outside, it would never leave me. I was only a passageway, a vestibule for this brightness . The seeing eye was in me.
A garden offers ground for growth, not only for plants that nourish and delight, but for engagement of self and world. Whether in the back forty acres or a small sunlit corner, for man or woman alike, to partake in the specific act of nurturing life brings insight not found in other pursuits. There is a sacramental element in watching a living thing flourish under our care toward its full potential, and what this nurturing opens in us becomes written on the human soul.