I picked up a journal at the bookstore this week. It’s called Parabola. Have you come across it? I remember seeing it years (maybe decades) ago, so when I spotted it this week I picked it up. I think I have a new favorite artist now.
I don’t know her name. She’s identified only as an old lady in an article by Ram Dass. Here’s his story:
I remember lecturing in a hall once, back in the early ‘70s. Most of my audience at that time was young, and they tended to wear white and smile a lot and wear flowers. I wore my Mala and had a long beard. In the front row there was a woman of about seventy, who had on a hat with little fake cherries and strawberries and things like that on it. She was wearing black oxfords and a print dress, and she had a black patent leather bag. I looked at her, and I couldn’t figure out what she was doing in the audience. She looked so dissimilar to all the rest.
These talks were like a gathering of an explorer’s club, where we would come together and just share our experiences. I started to describe some of my experiences, some of which were pretty far out. I looked at her, and she was nodding with understanding. I couldn’t believe that she could understand what I was talking about. I was describing experiences that I had using psychedelic chemicals, experiences that involved other planes of consciousness. I’d look over at her and there she was, nodding away. I began to think maybe she had a problem with her neck and maybe it had nothing whatsoever to do with what I was saying. I kept watching and getting more and more fascinated and getting more and more outrageous, and she kept nodding and nodding.
At the end of the lecture, I just kind of smiled at her so intensely that she just had to come up and speak to me. She came up and said, “Thank you so much. That makes perfect sense. That’s just the way I understand the universe to be.”
And I said, “How do you know? I mean, what have you done in your life that brought you into those kinds of experiences?”
She leaned forward very conspiratorially, and she said, “I crochet.”
Do you love that story as I do? And the woman? I hope so. I read it on the bus yesterday and nearly laughed out loud with delight. God, it seems to me, comes to whom he will, in the manner in which he will. But he seems to enjoy finding people at work with their hands, in a contemplative engagement.
I don’t know her name. She’s identified only as an old lady in an article by Ram Dass. Here’s his story:
I remember lecturing in a hall once, back in the early ‘70s. Most of my audience at that time was young, and they tended to wear white and smile a lot and wear flowers. I wore my Mala and had a long beard. In the front row there was a woman of about seventy, who had on a hat with little fake cherries and strawberries and things like that on it. She was wearing black oxfords and a print dress, and she had a black patent leather bag. I looked at her, and I couldn’t figure out what she was doing in the audience. She looked so dissimilar to all the rest.
These talks were like a gathering of an explorer’s club, where we would come together and just share our experiences. I started to describe some of my experiences, some of which were pretty far out. I looked at her, and she was nodding with understanding. I couldn’t believe that she could understand what I was talking about. I was describing experiences that I had using psychedelic chemicals, experiences that involved other planes of consciousness. I’d look over at her and there she was, nodding away. I began to think maybe she had a problem with her neck and maybe it had nothing whatsoever to do with what I was saying. I kept watching and getting more and more fascinated and getting more and more outrageous, and she kept nodding and nodding.
At the end of the lecture, I just kind of smiled at her so intensely that she just had to come up and speak to me. She came up and said, “Thank you so much. That makes perfect sense. That’s just the way I understand the universe to be.”
And I said, “How do you know? I mean, what have you done in your life that brought you into those kinds of experiences?”
She leaned forward very conspiratorially, and she said, “I crochet.”
Do you love that story as I do? And the woman? I hope so. I read it on the bus yesterday and nearly laughed out loud with delight. God, it seems to me, comes to whom he will, in the manner in which he will. But he seems to enjoy finding people at work with their hands, in a contemplative engagement.
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