Looking through our first issue of Angels on Earth magazine, back in September/October 1995, I rediscovered Jill D’Agnenica.

In 1993, this community-minded artist made and distributed 4,687 magenta plaster angels throughout Los Angeles. Figuring the city measures 468.7 square miles, she put 10 angels in each and every one—downtown, the barrio, the freeways, Watts. There were angels, literally, everywhere. They were numbered on the bottom, and their exact placement recorded.

By project’s end, Jill was left with a giant map of the city covered with photographs of all the angels in their individual drop-off spots. It was a good thing, too. Because the actual angel statues disappeared into the hands of their finders, “adopted” by the lucky ones who came across the surprise blessing. Which was Jill’s plan all along. “These angels are my prayers of peace for the people of Los Angeles,” Jill told Angels on Earth.

Five years later, Jill walked into a coffee shop and looked up to find one of her magenta angels smiling down on her from the rafters. The blessing she had surprised thousands with had now come back to her.

Click here to see more pictures of Jill’s angels.

I was already on my way to be with Dad when I realized I hadn’t even bothered to change out of my work clothes. It was a four-hour drive from my home outside of Atlanta to Asheville, North Carolina, where Dad was in the hospital having surgery to repair a patch for an aneurysm he’d suffered years earlier.

My brother, Joe, had called me at work to tell me the operation wasn’t going well. “They can’t stop the bleeding,” he said. “Dad’s arteries are too calcified. Can you come?” I finished my shift at the med-surg unit in the hospital, and stopped by the house to pack a bag and make sure my teenagers were set while I was away. I was still in my scrubs when I got in my car.

Joe had been at the hospital since early morning, but the surgery had been delayed until late afternoon. Then the complications. Joe would wait till Dad was out of surgery and go home to rest while I traveled.

I hated the idea of Dad being alone at the hospital, even for a few hours. I was a widow, raising two teenagers and working a busy job. Plus, there was Dad, 85, with just my brother and me to look out for him. Sometimes I felt alone in the face of it all.

The road wound through the mountains of North Carolina, the sky pitch dark. A wrong turn cost me another hour backtracking. It was nearly 2 a.m. before I reached the hospital.

Inside I approached the guard and gave him my father’s name. “Seibert,” he repeated. “Yes, he’s in the ICU. An older woman has been here visiting him. You just missed her.”

“You must be mistaken,” I said. “It’s just my brother and me. Dad has only the two of us.”

“I am sure of it,” he said. “Seibert’s an unusual name. The woman arrived after your brother left.”

I was more than familiar with hospital rules. No one who wasn’t family would be allowed to sit with Dad. My mother had died of a stroke soon after my husband was killed by a drunk driver. That was eight years ago. There was no one else. But there was no point in explaining all that to the guard. I simply thanked him and followed his directions to the ICU. A nurse unlocked the doors.

I explained I’d come to see Dad. “Wait here, please,” she said. She returned with a colleague who ushered me to my father’s bedside. The room was silent except for the whoosh of the ventilator. Tubes and wires criss-crossed Dad’s body, his eyes closed. I held his hand and prayed. “I’m here,” I told him. “I love you, Dad.”

After a while, a nurse asked me to go to the ICU waiting area, where families stayed near their loved ones without being in the way of staff. Numbly I walked down the hall. An older man greeted me. We talked and realized his wife was in the cubicle next to Dad’s.

“A woman has been with him, praying over him for hours,” the man said. “The nurses didn’t engage with her, but she was amazing to watch. I imagine that was your mom?”

I shook my head, not sure what to make of this second account.

“She was tall, willowy,” the man continued. “There was something so calming about her, radiant. She had long, light silver hair. She definitely made an impression.”

There was no one I knew who matched that description, including my mother. I politely excused myself and found a chair, slumping into it, mentally and physically exhausted.

The next morning my brother returned. I told Joe about the mysterious visitor. We asked the nurse who had been sitting with our dad before I arrived. “The night staff mentioned there was someone,” the nurse said. “But I don’t know anything more than that.”

Dad recovered in the days that followed. I met others who saw the woman who’d prayed over him, all of them commenting on her serene and peaceful nature. No one had spoken to her or inquired about who she was. My father had no memory of the woman, but hearing of her prayerful presence brought tears of joy. It was then that I knew she was an angel. She could have simply appeared and disappeared from Dad’s side without a trace. Instead, she revealed herself to nurses and visitors, even the guard, people God knew I would come across. He wanted me to know that Dad was never alone. And neither was I.

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For most of my life, I lived in New York. But six months ago, I moved to New Jersey to be closer to my daughter. She was fighting cancer, and I didn’t regret my decision to give her all the support I could on a moment’s notice. I was right where I wanted to be. The town was beautiful, and near the ocean, where I could take long walks, just as I had at Coney Island in New York.

Strolling along the Jersey shore, I just wished I felt more settled by now. I was so focused on my daughter I hadn’t had much time to make friends or find a new church home. The ocean was always where I’d felt closest to God, so I’d come today with a specific prayer for myself. It had been a while since I prayed for anything but my daughter’s health, so I was a little out of practice when it came to asking for something for me. I looked out at the turquoise waters. It would really help to feel your undeniable presence in my life today, Lord.

As a child, I often walked the Coney Island beach with my grandmother. She used to joke that I was drawn to the sea because I had mermaid blood running in my veins. Grandma came from a long line of seafaring Irishmen, so she knew all about mermaids. “You know, mermaid tears are blue and green,” she used to say. “That’s what gives the ocean its color.”

“Mermaids are just fairy tales, Grandma,” I told her. “You’ve never seen one.”

“Well, I’ve never seen God either, but I know he’s real. Don’t you?”

Grandma was teasing, but all these years later, her point still stood. I knew God heard my prayer today, like every day, even if I couldn’t see him. I just longed for reassurance that he was with me, even when I was feeling a bit isolated.

I scanned the water for mermaids in memory of Grandma’s lesson, then headed back to my car. I took a wrong turn on my way home—all the streets still looked alike to me. Luckily, I spotted a roadside vendor up ahead, an older gentleman surrounded by a jumble of pots and pans, toys, record albums and knitwear. I pulled up and lowered the window. “Can you help me get home?”

“Sure can,” he said, running a hand through his long white hair. “Have a look around while I look in my truck for a map.”

I didn’t think I’d find much among his wares to interest me, but I got out to be polite. I was examining an old porcelain sink when a painting caught my eye. It was hung up on a fence above my head: a painting of Jesus walking beside a sea the color of mermaid tears.

The vendor came back with his maps. “Nice, isn’t it?” he said, jerking his chin at the painting. “I picked it up from the curb. Hoped it would find its way to the right person one day. Looks like that’s you.”

Before I could object, he was reaching above my head to take the painting off the fence. His sleeve bunched around his shoulder when he stretched his arm up, revealing a tattoo that Grandma would have loved. “A mermaid!” I said.

“Isn’t it a beaut? Got it when I was in the Navy,” he said. “You know, it could be that I even saw a mermaid from the ship.” He gave me a wink and some directions, then loaded up my purchase.

Driving off, I had the distinct impression that I’d just been sent an angelic message from the ocean. God had indeed followed me to my home in New Jersey, where I’d hang my beautiful new painting.

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