Om Ganesha,
Evening Pujas and Prayers
From Our Guru Jaya Das, my Son, The Queen of Queens.
Namaste my beloved Ma,
It’s Saturday, dawn, and for over 50 years, I’m always been that “other” guy in bed who the alarm woke and darn it, got up. Never loitering, nor nursing a morning cup-a-java, hair in curlers, in my marabou feathered robe, pink fuzzy slippers, a cigarette dangling from my lips, reading the comics. I was always a working shoe dog, “no business like shoe business”, and Saturday was always just another schlepping day. Old habits die hard, thank god! Now this self annointed dowager queen awaken’s with the joy of loving a guru, who helps me to find the self discipline, to light my artery clogged heart with the joy of love, to make Saturday a day to serve and be compassionate of others and thankfully not worry about having enough pairs of white pumps or “Mary Janes” on the shelves or on the tables for Easter sales. As you can can guess I was a low down discounter, a blue light special kind of shoe person, and look at me now I’m called Poppi, one of your youngest “old as dirt” chelas.
My beloved Ganga and Yumuna are both down and out with an awful case of stomach flu and back up Peter has gone to Washington DC to be honored by the Library Of Congress for helping found a legendary comic group called the “Firesign Theatre”. Get well soon my Rivers and YAY Peter, and thumb your’e nose at “W” for all of us when you visit D.C., but I still don’t have a clue who will fill in to help me serve. I drive to the Ashram, the streets still empty except for the early line up of day laborers at Home Depot and the the orthodox Chassidic’s walking to temple, reflecting that the main religion is the spirit of kindness and one has to be grateful and serve others to be part of this religion.
Breakfast at the Ashram turns out to be an old Hollywood star gay gabfest.. After all we all live in Hollywood and over the years most everyone seen some stars. Acharya Swami Shiva relates about Johnny Mathis cruising down Sunset Boulevard, bumping shopping carts in the market with the real Bette Davis, he speechless unable to take his eyes off her, and also looking out his car window directlyat Frank Sinatra and Liz Taylor in their convertable. I reveal about a long train ride, in intimate conversation with Montgomery Clift or at a party with a young, drunk as a skunk Rock Hudson. We all agree how pretty Tab Hunter once was. Our own Bette Davis, Janaka Jaya stays tight lipped about the famous movis star he massages, whose initials are G.P., oops. Well, girls will be girls.
Everyone pitches in, as Laxman Das sets up the folding table assembly line in a jiffy, with the additional support of Janaka Jaya, and Kali Baba forming a core queer quartette for food prep. For these smaller runs we draw an outliline of a big heart directly on the bags and inscribe inside it “MA LOVES YOU”, Kali Baba to the rescue, as he offers to help do the run and serve. Riding in the car some radio commenator talks about the secret of happiness is not about health or even money but about having a sense of purpose in your life, and I was again reminded of the beauty of your teaching Ma, that it was in the way we serve, which gives such a sense of purpose in our own life. As we manuver the streets I can recall just a few weeks ago how when we tried to serve ran into an awesome sight, in what is usually a quiet downtown. It’s L.A., where downtown is dead on the weekend except for the homeless. Stuck for hours in a traffic jam we ran into hundreds of thousands of peaceful protesters, more people than anyone had ever seen, the biggest demonstaration in L.A. history. It was the immigrant face of the most multi cultural city in America, our maids, janitors, bus boys, cooks, gardeners, fruit pickers, and students protesting impending legislation against illegals and the people that hire them. Many were carrying American flags, some with pictures of their loved ones serving in the military. We held over 100 sandwiches overnight and returned to a quiet, amazingly clean city, and served on Sunday morning. Thomas we call “outback man” for the funny hats he wears, sometimes two at a time, yet always sober, drug free. I delivered the Advil he needed, his feet swelling. He like many of the others is hassled by the police, but they return to their old haunts, usually. Thomas is a fixture on the corner, I see him there day and night. Wearing his U.S. Marshalls badge didn’t seem to scare off the cops. My god the courage and tenacity it takes to live on the streets. Thomas wore his old Navy Seal emblem on a shirt, revealing something about his past life. Unexpectedly sighted David, we call Buddah Boy, cause of his big belly and beautiful smiling face, lying in complete squalor in a tunnel to downtown. He often looked sick and when we didn’t see him anymore, his tatteredmattress gone, we though he had died, and we were filled with sadness, recalling so many of the faces who were familiar, and then never saw anymore. When I saw David, looking alive and quite well and smiling, I was buoyant. Echo Park always quiet, far enough awy from downtown and the eyes of cops is now a new haven for the homeless. We are besieged for food, regretting there was not more made to serve. How many is enough in a city of 90,000 homeless? Kali Baba asks about our oldest street pals, Louie and Irma, and sadly I relate they were last up on a hill, also hassled by police and a few months ago their camp was gone, not seen since. “Where?” Kali Baba asked and I pointed to the steep hill behind the billboard and to my amzement, I saw what looked like a camp. We stopped and both climbed up the hill, and there was Irma and we hugged, like the kin we all are. “Where the hell you been girl, leaving no forwarding address” I squealed. Louie was out on on the job, recycling, earning the few dollars he can get. Irma again told that they had applied for section 8 housing, losing out before when they spent a few days in jail. There was little food left but it was shared with another couple also now on the hill. In my joy in seeing our old friends I asked what Irma needed for next week, and she smiled her toothless broad grin and said “slippers, size 9” and the old shoe man in me already had the pink furry ones I imagined myself wearing and knew next week I would bring them back to her, and hopefully she’ll be there or sure as hell I’ll be wearing them.
A few hours later and we are all back at the Ashram, awaiting your Global Phone Darshan and if I’m the oldest guy in the room and it feels good to see the newest generation now showing it’s face, Bhagavati Das now bringing one of his young son’s, Ganesha. Now all of us to drink in the positive light of the mother. I clearly see the blessing of having a Guru as a child and the grace it bestows on that child and how blessed I have been in the 8 beautiful years I have known you. In that time, at the twilight of my life, how new life has flowed inward with your love, and outward, learning in my path of devotion, to live in service to my beloved by learning the beauty of how to serve others, In the pursuit of doing that service, I have become awakened and compassionate, after I already thought, I had arrived, and was already there. Like you my beloved Ma, I sparkle with the joy of just being chela and the ultimate joy of having a guru, just like you. In the meditation everything becomes magnified, especially love and the negative becomes smaller and smaller, and I know the tenderness toward myself and others felt so today will in some way help makee a better world.
Your loving son, Guru Jaya “Poppi” Das