Diary

Diary-Surgery Day- Sept. 28, 1998-10

11:55 a.m.

It was not your way to go to meetings or attend the many gatherings of devotees at the conferences in the states. Reading Mother's words or reciting a solemn prayer in silence were more clearly your inner inclination.

There will be for my remaining days, wonderful memories of your experiences, some of which you have shared with me, such as your dream Thursday morning after the sledge hammer words of Dr. Dixon came crashing down. I have typed it out and sent it to Chali and will include it at the end of this meditation and remembrance.

You mentioned that you dreamt of a wooden structure like a cabinet with many, many drawers. Since it was such a vivid dream you asked Arindam Basu its meaning. He told you that each of the drawers contained the gifts that Mother was giving you. And here, for others, is your dream of Mother.

"Trying to reach a destination as yet unknown. Sometimes with Narad, sometimes alone, hostile beings trying to destroy us which we either fought & beat down or ran away from.

Finally came to a gathering of others who had undergone the same kinds of battles to reach this place. There was a building - not Matrimandir; just an ordinary looking western style, long rectangular building with a peaked roof. It appeared new for the structure was complete but it had no exterior finish.

As everyone gathered together we realized Mother was there - not above or apart, but among us as one of us. She asked us to come into the building and when we were all inside She told us she wanted us to finish the building. She said, 'I will show you how to do it,' and She took the edge of a piece of cloth and pulled it back, turning it over by folding it back upon itself (as one would do if reversing a large, heavy carpet). She said, 'I want you to cover the building in this way with this cloth for on the other side is the New Consciousness. It is so close, and it is not so difficult, it is very simple if you enfold yourselves as I have shown you with the cloth.'"

12:03 p.m.

Remembering the many journeys taken, the great life experiences shared in the wilds of Nature - our scuba diving (at first you thought claustrophobia would prevent you from completing the training course in the pool, but when you entered the ocean you took to it so naturally (and were far better than I!), the sea plane over Moosehead Lake in Maine, whitewater rafting on the Kennebec in Maine and the Nantahala in North Carolina, our unforgettable three week car tour of Alaska and the Kenai peninsula, the light plane over the ice fields - so many experiences, so many joys, and yet, as difficult as it might have been at times, we lived twelve years in Auroville, building the Matrimandir Gardens. She gave us the opportunity of many lifetimes and in my heart's depthI believe we were sent as the pioneers who broke the hard resisting clay of the raped and arid land of Auroville, providing thousands and thousands of trees for afforestation and introducing so many new plants of economic and aesthetic value. And through all the fierce struggles with health, lack of funds and meager food, you stood with me, planting trees and flowers.

To more than sixty of the flowers we introduced into the Matrimandir Gardens Mother gave significances which will resound through the corridors of time for all ages to remember and for the swift uplift of those whose aspiration to grow within is worked out through the flowers. I shall remember, long after this body is no longer, the lovely lobelia, 'Cambridge Blue', which She named "Remembrance of Sri Aurobindo" and the myrtle, "To live only for the Divine", and so many others. I shall have to search for the list. We disciplined ourselves, with no formal training, to study the new plants intimately, observing daily and noting the changes weekly throughout the nursery, monthly in the many gardens in Madras, enduring those bus rides from Hell, and quarterly the Lal-Bagh and other gardens in Bangalore. How we delighted in the seeds of new hibiscus from the American Hibiscus Society and the hibiscus plants gathered throughout India, so many of which Mother named, and all the plumerias and other magnificent flowering plants we were able to collect in our travels in India, Japan, Hawaii, Thailand, Singapore, and of course, the U.S.

At times I have felt that we compressed many lifetimes into one - all through the supreme Grace that has blessed, nurtured and guided, uplifted and protected us through all.

Thank you beloved soul for all the years you have stood by my side, bearing with my moments of impatience and anger, curtness and misconceptions - always supporting, always calming and ever helping to give more focus to the goal of our lives. Thank you also for your touch of beauty and refinement that are no less than your soul's most natural expression.