By all accounts, Erin Fisher was an exceptional
young woman - bright, beautiful, compassionate and full of spiritual
energy that touched just about everyone she ever met.
Her death just before her 21st birthday shattered the lives of
the many who loved her. For a parent, it was "the most terrible
loss imaginable, the ultimate of losses," her mother wrote
in an extraordinary book about Erin.
Helen M. Fisher, author of "From Erin with Love," moved
to Bend a few months ago with her husband, Ron, who retired after
a long career in management for JC Penney Co. If you bumped into
Helen and Ron around town, you'd never guess that this is a couple
who believe beyond doubt that they are still communicating with
their beloved daughter.
None of the stereotypes fit, anyway. No beads or crystals, incense
burners or Tarot cards are there to greet you in the Fisher's
attractive home on Awbrey Butte. They're buttoned-down business
people - centered, very private, feet-on-the-ground types that
you probably wouldn't peg as believers in psychic phenomena.
"Sometimes we get 'The Look' when talking about our experiences,"
Helen says. "Some people are understandably wary. The more
common reaction, though, is belief. Over and over again, we hear
from people who have had similar things happen."
The Fishers' remarkable experiences are revealed in Helen's self-published
book, subtitled "Knowledge of Life After Death." She'll
talk about it at 7 p.m. Thursday at Bend's Barnes & Noble
store.
You'd think a book about a child's death would be a downer, but
this one isn't. Surprisingly, I found it to be not so much sad
as moving and ultimately uplifting.
The first half is composed of entries from Erin's journal along
with notes written by her friends and family, all skillfully
woven together with narrative by Helen Fisher. The story becomes
riveting as it builds toward Father's Day, June 18, 1989, when
Erin succumbed to complications caused by treatment for Hodgkin's
Disease.
At the time, she was a college student in central California,
where Oregon natives Helen and Ron had raised their two daughters,
Erin and Lizz, while Ron was managing JC Penney stores.
Helen describes herself and her husband before Erin's death as
"very normal, down-to-earth people" who leaned toward
agnosticism but who never would have dreamed of communicating
through psychic media.
The change in their belief system is the essence of the second
half of Helen's book - an account of the couple's journey through
excruciating grief toward belief in life ever after and the possibility
of departed loved ones making spiritual contact with the living.
"There's much we don't understand about the hereafter,"
says Ron, "but I think it's like a parallel universe in
which the soul creates its own reality."
Like any hardboiled news guy, I was skeptical when I showed up
at the Fisher home. But like a lot of people they've met, I've
had similar unexplained events happen within my own family, so
I wanted to hear their story firsthand and ask some questions.
They elaborated on a string of occurrences indicating that their
Erin has not only attempted contact with loved ones but has succeeded.
One form of this communication, the Fishers fervently believe,
involves the frequent appearance of butterflies, indicating Erin's
spiritual presence.
The Fishers' belief in this phenomenon began at the scattering
of Erin's ashes, when a yellow and black butterfly showed up
and stayed, causing Helen's sister Linda to collapse. When she
came to, she explained that exactly such a butterfly, framed
in white light, had appeared to her in a dream the night before.
A third sister, Kathy confirmed that Linda had told her about
the dream but they had kept if from Helen.
Two days later, at a memorial service, Helen told friends to
think of Erin whenever they saw a yellow and black butterfly.
In her book, Helen describes what happened as the service concluded:
"my sister Kathy excitedly grabbed my arm, pointed and exclaimed,
'Look at the butterfly. Look at the butterfly. Look at the butterfly.'
There it was, a huge black and yellow butterfly flying in a straight
line down the hill into the amphitheater. It flew back and forth
over the seats and then away."
Coincidence? Perhaps, Helen concedes. But the same sort of butterfly
has come back into the Fishers' lives innumerable times at significant
moments.
I have to admit I didn't quite know what to think of all this
as the couple showed me around their home. I looked at their
handsome collection of Western art, at Helen's lovely butterfly
collection and at all the photos of Erin and her sister. And
then, as I glanced through a pair of glass doors, I saw something
yellow and black flitting over the flower garden in their shady
back yard. The Fishers saw it, too.
"It's a swallowtail," Helen said, beaming. "Isn't
this fun?"
I've never seen a stronger expression of absolute faith than
what I saw in the glow on her face. It helped me feel something
powerful, something beyond my comprehension, and I don't know
what it could have been except the presence of someone who cared
deeply about the healing of this heartbroken couple.
