Last Trip to India

     In 1996, I went to India for the last time.  It was not a good decision in retrospect.  In a thirty-three year history, forty-eight now, of being with Baba, from a Baba family, and having been twice as a child and once as an adult already, ten years prior, it was the fourth in four decades and the last.
     You probably wonder why I say, it was a bad decision.  Well, the ticket was really cheap, and then I guess I could afford it, but I was working at a health food store, and had to ask for time off, but I also had my children staying with their dad in Colorado.  Some people think it is good for women who are separated or divorced to take a time period, when they let the father take the kids, but I have always felt guilty about that period of time.  
     I feel like I went to India for the wrong reasons, and I knew it.  I was chasing a guy, I had already had a two year relationship, living together, with.  But, in some ways, perhaps, the wrong reasons lead you to the right place at times.
     I arrived in Bombay, on my own, at the age of thirty-five, wearing a long Indian skirt I had purchased in London, on another crazy escapade to see the same guy, the summer before, and a black t-shirt, green silk scarf, and a Baba button.
     It was pouring rain, and I had had two Johnny Walkers on the plane.  When I got outside, a man held a sign with my name in large print.  He came with an umbrella and led me to the car.
     I stayed up in the lobby of the Leela hotel all night, and talked to the waiters or they talked to me.  I had another drink as soon as I got there, a martini, a ten dollar one, crazy.
     We left for Amednagar very early, and I slept on the back seat, getting up to take pictures of the monkeys in the mountains, on the side of the highway.
     I guess it was noon, by the time we got there.  I sang at the tomb that night, the samadhi, they call it.  There are two artis a day there.  I usually did not make it to the early one, unless, I had garlands to bring, which I bought on the side of the road when we went to the trust office on the bus.
     My father had given me money to do this, money for this purpose.  His writing is published in The Glow if you google Lyn Ott excerpts, Glow Magazine, and you will find a whole very well done website on him, with pictures, etc..  However, I am not him, but me.  He was a very devout Baba follower, and I do not know what I am, in terms of Baba, or God for that matter.
     My parents' murals decorated the old pilgrim center, where I stayed.  You could only see the mandali on Tuesdays.  Mani had recently passed away, but Eruch, Gohair and Meheru were still there.  Also, Arnavas, who I spent much time with.  Dr. Gohair gave me some possessions of both Mani and Mehera, earrings, a picture and a handkerchief.  The latter two were Mehera's, but she had given me gifts, which belonged to her, and Baba trinkets as well, when she was alive, also letters and a letter to my estranged husband, in '86, her idea, not mine.  I suppose another son came about, due to that, but it is a whole other story.
     It is hard for me to finish writing this, because I have some regrets, and I wish I had been making different decisions, and I feel like I did not really feel Baba on that trip.  I think romantic involvements can be kind of stupid.  I mean if you find the right person, and they are nice and you stay together, then that is wonderful.  But, sometimes I think I would have been much better with no one, than the wrong one.  You know someone is wrong for you when they make you incredibly unhappy.  I used to want to appear spiritual, and status used to mean something to me, but it no longer does, and I no longer do.  My values have changed.  I think kids should come first.  I think money is better spent buying a house, rather than globe trotting.  I guess I just had a bad trip, but I think I woke up in a weird mood, so this is one of the worst blogs I have ever written.
     
     Okay, I had coffee and a small breakfast, and my blood sugar is back up.  I will share the good part.  I read a ghazel by my father, which he asked me to read in Mandali Hall, in the presence of Eruch, and I got to spend some time with Eruch, who I really liked very much, before he died.  
     Also, I got to sing in Mandali Hall, a little performance, and have pictures of these things, since I had brought a camera, and someone took pictures.  
     I sang and played Sita Ram, the traditional Indian folk song a lot, and the servants loved it, as well as the Indian people at the dhuni, since it was a national favorite, Gandhi's favorite song, which is in Hindi.
     As I wrote in my last blog, about the history of folk music, American I talked about, but songs of political and peaceful statements are what folk music is all about.
Sometimes, they are love songs or a story, but that usually make a statement about the place in time, such as Geordie, the old English ballad, where a maiden who is pregnant with her love's third child, and pleads at London Court, for his life.  He is royalty, but "stole sixteen of the king's royal deer, and sold them in Boheny."  In the end, he is hung in a golden chain, because the judge will not pardon him.
     As I told a fellow on Facebook, who was telling me that seeking was the way, not desire, he is right.  He made me mad, because I know my own past short comings, and writing about what an idiot I was, I brought it on myself.  But, I am in the process of ego annihilation, and I do not really care what anyone says about me anymore, well maybe I care a little, but he is stating the obvious.  I am sure he meant well, and feels he needs to teach me something.  That is how people are, sometimes.