END OF AN ERA IN THE HIMALAYAS

"And some we loved

The loveliest and the best

Have one by one

Crept silently to rest"

Today I have received news of the passing away of Mrs. Patricia Keelan, my former teacher at Vincent Hill School, a Seventh Day Adventist school in Mussoorie, where I had studied many years ago, and where I remember her as a young lady teacher.

She was now 85 years old and was living all alone in the Himalayas in the house her husband had built. Her husband had passed away a few years ago. She had continued to stay on in the isolation of the hills in a remote area of Mussoorie, a place which was bitterly cold in the winter and wet with the rains in the monsoon seasons.

Her son Bruce is in an affluent position in the US as an Engineer and had asked her to live with him in the relative comfort of America. But she refused to leave the Himalayas and stayed on here bravely all alone.

Many a time she was gravely ill but managed to bounce back to good health. Whenever I found out that she was ill I rushed over to meet her. The last was in November 27th. She had kidney failure but appeared to be doing well.

An American doctor, Dr. Roma Taylor happened to be visiting me at the time and I took her with myself to see Mrs. Keelan. She was as cheerful as could be expected, but then she was always cheerful in all circumstances of life.

( In the attached picture from the left to the right of the picture there are Dr. Taylor, Mrs. Keelan, myself, Priya Nath Mehta)

Once when she had been praising some TV Preacher on the "God" Channel, I said to her:

"Mrs. Keelan! These TV preachers who strut about on the stage with a microphone held in their hands, shouting loudly at their congregations, do not have even an iota of the spirituality which you possess. They move around with a bevy of secretaries, assistants, managers, and cars, and preach the life of humility to the masses calling them sinners and asking them to repent.

"But you are sitting here alone in the Himalayan mountains with no one with you except God. They speak about God, but you have God with you all the time. He has been protecting you all these years. Your life itself has been a miracle!"

She had once fallen down a flight of cement steps and did not have even a scratch, far less any broken bones. What could have been a greater miracle than that! She had kidney failure with practically zero medical aid and always managed to survive!

Whenever I had come to see her she had bounced back into good health again.

But as I left her on the afternoon of November 27, 2012, something in my heart told me that I would not be seeing her again.

There were tears in my eyes as I said to her as I left:

"Mrs. Keelan! Blessed are the pure in heart for they shall see God!"

And that is where she has gone - to God.