the PDF of her book - National Aphasia Association

80 Ruth Codier Resch Without Utterance:
I know that my old friend is dead. I try to think otherwise, but it is no use. I
cannot rationalize this.
A year later I’m telling an old college buddy the story of my crow friend.
We’re sitting at the iron table in the little sunny glade in the bottom of my
yard, now a burgeoning a young forest of red twig dogwood bushes around
us. Suddenly around our heads a wild cacophony of crows circles, and we
can barely hear each other. I struggle to go on with the story as they continue
their chorus around it. When I’m done, they abruptly stop, as if the crows
have punctuated my story with theirs.
A few years later I’ve remodeled the garage into a garden office with
windows facing out into the yard. Ruth Chaffee, my professional colleague,
and I are having an afternoon peer session, talking together about more
difficult concerns in our work with patients. We’re chatting first. I’ve gone to
my son-in-law’s recent talk at a bookstore in a nearby city. I’m thrilled with
what a wonderful storyteller he is, and I begin to relate to her part of the story
he told about the great mystic Rabbi, the Bal Shem Tov.
Before I know it I tell the whole story:
An old peasant farmer had for many years promised himself he
would take the long journey to pray with the Bal Shem Tov at Yom Kippur,
the deepest day of self-reflection for the new year. He began to walk, with
no goat to ride and no passers-by to give him a lift. After many days he
was still far away, and now he was in the dark forest night. A simple
man, he didn’t know the prayers, but did know the Hebrew alphabet. He
called to God, “You know all the prayers; please arrange these letters into
prayers,” and all night long he repeated the letters.
A great cacophony of crows whirls and caws above my garden, intruding
their loud voices into my telling.