Sometimes we just get lucky. Really and truly and amazingly lucky.

Several years ago, I wrote this little essay and sent it around to as many people as I could think of:

I told a friend in Mumbai that I was coming there in March to headhunt for a speech therapist and she reacted in mock horror: “Don’t you dare come and poach in our territory!” she warned. “We need all the speech therapists ourselves.”

 Now I know Vibha was teasing. But at the same time, there was an element of truth in her concern. Speech therapists are worth their weight in gold, and good ones are worth triple. They are also painfully hard to find and the search grows increasingly desperate as more people around the country understand the value of the profession. The demand far outpaces the supply and many who are available are not particularly good. Pediatric speech therapists are virtually unheard of in India and creative, imaginative professionals are rare.

So what to do? We all budget for speech therapists and we all are willing to pay more than we can afford if we find someone. The problem is that we can’t find anyone. Good training institutes are almost as rare as good therapists (the one at AIIMS closed recently!), so it’s not even just a question of motivating more kids to take up the profession. Who’s going to teach them?

Meanwhile, back at the ranch, creative special educators are being pressed into service as speech therapists because whether a qualified person is there or not, the children still need therapy. At Karuna Vihar, our special educators know how to develop language skills in children with mental handicap because that’s part of what they do as teachers. They already understand child development, activity based learning and the importance of play. And so, we thought, why not develop them as speech therapists?

Here’s our idea:

We had amazing success when Paula (our first principal) trained our team over 12 years ago. Through a careful, activity based approach, she was able to create a team of special educators who could rival the best in the world. We are now considering a pilot project in which we will select two or three special educators and train them, through a one-year full-time course, as speech therapists.

The course will be also open to other institutions working in the area who will be asked to sponsor one or two candidates for the course (with final selection in our hands), for a maximum of 25. It will be taught by senior speech therapists from abroad whom we will expect (as in “Expect Miracles”) to join us for six month modules.

One of the beauties of this idea is that the training will be in functional speech therapy. The trainees will not be qualified speech therapists with recognized degrees. They will obviously be paid more on completion of the course because they will be that much better at their jobs, but they will not be in a position to go abroad as therapists on the strength of the training they receive. We will be creating a new breed of superbly qualified special educators. Imagine never having to worry about speech therapy again! (Or at least not as much. Some of us just like to worry.)

So that was my essay. Somehow, amazingly, it ended up being published in the Bulletin of the Royal College of Speech and Language Therapists in London.

How? Why?  Who knows? Who cares? These things happen.

Anne Bruce, Speech Therapist and Human Being Extraordinaire, read it and was moved. This was in 2007.

Obviously, she was meant to be with us. For a quick glance at my email from that year reveals only our disorganization and her persistence.

This was her first email: I am a recently retired SLT with some years’ experience in working with children with disabilities. I would be interested in further detail about the job you advertised in the recent Bulletin Supplement Of the RCSLT journal.

Apparently, I didn’t respond.

One month later: I e-mailed you about the job advert in the SLT Bulletin last month and have had no reply. Is there still a job to be applied for? If so, I would be grateful if you would send me some information.

Still, shockingly, I did not reply.

Another month later: I wonder if for some reason you did not receive my two previous e-mails. I am interested in the post you advertised in the RCSLT Bulletin, and would be grateful if you would send me further details. Is the post still vacant?

Finally, apparently (I can’t find these letters), I did respond, but then quickly dropped the ball again. She then wrote to our website saying:

I have been in touch with Jo a couple of times on the subject of a six-month employment which was advertised in the SLT Bulletin. I have sent my CV, but have had no reponse. Is there still a vacancy?

What was wrong with me? Desperate for a speech therapist but too busy to respond when one offered her services? And – perhaps more to the point – what was wrong with her? Why did she not just give up and go and find a more responsive organization?

Clearly, we were meant to meet. We could not have known it then, but it was the start of a beautiful friendship.

Anne came for the first time five years ago and bowled us all over and under with her skill, her energy and her insight. Then she came again. And again. And again. This year marked her fifth visit, but, Anne-like, she was not content to simply continue on the trajectory she had already established.

No. This time, she brought “back up”.

Young speech therapists! THREE of them!  Unprecedented. Astonishing.
Leave it to Anne.

I asked her one day how she did it. She is 70 years old. She has children and she has grandchildren. Where did she find the energy, the drive?

Typically, she dismissed the idea that she might be special. “This is how 70 looks now,” she insisted.

I don’t accept it. Here’s what I’ve learned from Anne – Three things. Concise and telling: Stay fit. Stay interested. Cultivate young friends.

“Cultivating” sounds slightly matlabi and clinical. But not with Anne. Every friendship is down to the bone; every new relationship means a lifetime of loyalty and commitment.

I hardly know how to describe this. Anne has entered our lives with a full heart and a deep passion for the work we are doing.  She works with grace and integrity and she teaches us to do the same. Bless her.