my home town in India...
I have a new lady friend. Her name is Retta. We met each other in person for the first time on Thursday. Of course, me being the dominate male, I insisted we do something that I enjoy. I made her go to the cemetery and model for me. :) She was a good sport about it and was extremely beautiful. A fine new addition to my collection of Cemetery Girls.
She and I met at this online dating service called OkCupid last autum and have communicated via emails and on the phone. We both have been very busy with our own activities and don't live in the same city, thus the length of time it's taken us to meet. Anyway, we're talking about hanging out some more. I think we get along pretty well, on a casual basis so far at least.
So at one point in our conversation the other day we both used the word "stuck" to describe the cities that we live in. My town, San Ramon has felt like a prison to me for a very long time due to it's lack of culturally diverse activities but mainly because there is zero sub-culture here. I am the most unusual person living in this city, and that's not saying much. I live and act as boldly as I can to be who I am, but overall, my efforts to find
people like myself, with alternative interests goes unanswered.
Retta on the other hand, did not so much use the term "stuck" to describe her situation. A friend of hers had used the term. "How long have you been -stuck- in Berkeley now?" She said if she could choose to live somewhere else it would be Santa Cruz. That was sweet to hear! She went on to explain that she had developed a personal philosophy that despite there being things that she disliked about where she lived, she was living in the most perfect place on earth that there was for her.
This brought an instant sense of higher, inner awareness to me. Oh, and something else interesting came to my awareness while I spent time with Retta. She lives right on the corner of Alcatraz & College. I asked her how long she had been at that location. Since 1994 she said. Well, the majority of the time that I had spent in that neighborhood while I was involved with the ashram was 89 -94. Billy and I moved to Santa Cruz in 95, but there was a period of time when she and I were in the same town, yet to my knowledge, we had never met before. And she said that she was familiar with the Siddha ashram and Gurumayi.
Anyway, the idea of "where you are", no matter where that is, being the perfect place on the entire earth for you to be struck a chord within me. And flashing back to ashram philosophy I was reminded of how the location in India of the "mother ashram" that Muktananda and Nityananda had developed back in the 50's and 60's was a place like Eden on Earth started to make sense to me. I lived in a place that my mind created issues with, but in pure spiritual reality, there is absolutely nothing wrong with it. I live in a place where other heavenly beings dwell and walk the streets.
Now this is actually going to take some time for me to fully integrate a healthy and positive attitude of awareness towards, but I think the seed was planted a long time ago, and Retta's words on Thursday were drops of nutrition that caused them to germinate and begin to fruit for me. Something concrete and tangible had begun to manifest a few weeks ago when I did a major overhaul on my living space in this house. Cleaned out my office and got the feng shui flowing. Now I have three working areas for writing and photo work. I have two comfortable places to sit and read. I have room to get down on the floor and do calisthenics and yoga.
Today I did something else positive for myself. It started yesterday, and it still plays with this metaphor of "planting seeds". I have a little deck outside my window. On the deck there are a couple of planters. One has a geranium growing in it. The other is empty. I have had this packet of sweet pea seeds in my possession for a couple of years now that I've dreamed of planting, but just never have. It's a long story, about why I do not plant or grow things at this house, and I can't go into it now.
So yesterday I said to hell with it, and I planted those seeds in the planter. Then today, a new Facebook friend of mine (a Parisian woman painter who I am entirely smitten with) posted something silly on! A grow it yourself can of Venus Flytraps for children for sale on eBay. I wanted to get it! But it was eBay U.K. and the shipping was too expensive. That led me to look up "unusual flowers" on our eBay though. And I found two bargains for seeds of some flowering plants that I can grow inside my rooms!
Blue passionfruit and Madagascar jasmine. It might be really hard to grow these from seed but I'm going to try. And the jasmine I am very excited about as the fragrance is one of the most intoxicating I can think of in all the world. I think that is all I'm going to say for now.
She and I met at this online dating service called OkCupid last autum and have communicated via emails and on the phone. We both have been very busy with our own activities and don't live in the same city, thus the length of time it's taken us to meet. Anyway, we're talking about hanging out some more. I think we get along pretty well, on a casual basis so far at least.
So at one point in our conversation the other day we both used the word "stuck" to describe the cities that we live in. My town, San Ramon has felt like a prison to me for a very long time due to it's lack of culturally diverse activities but mainly because there is zero sub-culture here. I am the most unusual person living in this city, and that's not saying much. I live and act as boldly as I can to be who I am, but overall, my efforts to find
people like myself, with alternative interests goes unanswered.
Retta on the other hand, did not so much use the term "stuck" to describe her situation. A friend of hers had used the term. "How long have you been -stuck- in Berkeley now?" She said if she could choose to live somewhere else it would be Santa Cruz. That was sweet to hear! She went on to explain that she had developed a personal philosophy that despite there being things that she disliked about where she lived, she was living in the most perfect place on earth that there was for her.
This brought an instant sense of higher, inner awareness to me. Oh, and something else interesting came to my awareness while I spent time with Retta. She lives right on the corner of Alcatraz & College. I asked her how long she had been at that location. Since 1994 she said. Well, the majority of the time that I had spent in that neighborhood while I was involved with the ashram was 89 -94. Billy and I moved to Santa Cruz in 95, but there was a period of time when she and I were in the same town, yet to my knowledge, we had never met before. And she said that she was familiar with the Siddha ashram and Gurumayi.
Anyway, the idea of "where you are", no matter where that is, being the perfect place on the entire earth for you to be struck a chord within me. And flashing back to ashram philosophy I was reminded of how the location in India of the "mother ashram" that Muktananda and Nityananda had developed back in the 50's and 60's was a place like Eden on Earth started to make sense to me. I lived in a place that my mind created issues with, but in pure spiritual reality, there is absolutely nothing wrong with it. I live in a place where other heavenly beings dwell and walk the streets.
Now this is actually going to take some time for me to fully integrate a healthy and positive attitude of awareness towards, but I think the seed was planted a long time ago, and Retta's words on Thursday were drops of nutrition that caused them to germinate and begin to fruit for me. Something concrete and tangible had begun to manifest a few weeks ago when I did a major overhaul on my living space in this house. Cleaned out my office and got the feng shui flowing. Now I have three working areas for writing and photo work. I have two comfortable places to sit and read. I have room to get down on the floor and do calisthenics and yoga.
Today I did something else positive for myself. It started yesterday, and it still plays with this metaphor of "planting seeds". I have a little deck outside my window. On the deck there are a couple of planters. One has a geranium growing in it. The other is empty. I have had this packet of sweet pea seeds in my possession for a couple of years now that I've dreamed of planting, but just never have. It's a long story, about why I do not plant or grow things at this house, and I can't go into it now.
So yesterday I said to hell with it, and I planted those seeds in the planter. Then today, a new Facebook friend of mine (a Parisian woman painter who I am entirely smitten with) posted something silly on! A grow it yourself can of Venus Flytraps for children for sale on eBay. I wanted to get it! But it was eBay U.K. and the shipping was too expensive. That led me to look up "unusual flowers" on our eBay though. And I found two bargains for seeds of some flowering plants that I can grow inside my rooms!
Blue passionfruit and Madagascar jasmine. It might be really hard to grow these from seed but I'm going to try. And the jasmine I am very excited about as the fragrance is one of the most intoxicating I can think of in all the world. I think that is all I'm going to say for now.
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