911

You know I've always had trouble with my knees. I think it's from past lives when I spend so much time kneeling at the altar as a nun. Anyway, in this life I haven't done much kneeling but I have spend many hours sitting in a half lotus position at the Ashram. Last week I woke up and could hardly walk at all. I applied Vicks and begged Swami to fix it so by about 12 I was able to cut up my salad, micro wave my frozen lunch and make it across the street to the Senior Center. Next night got up to pee at 2 and everything was OK. By 4 o'clock I was unable to put any weight on my left leg so I held on to the doors and walls to get to the John. I don't know that anyone uses that term anymore but...there I sat. Please Swami, I prayed...what can I do? The phone is in the living room and I can't even move my leg.

Then I remembered the long white cord on the wall. We have to push a button every morning to let the desk know we're alive and connected to this button is a cord. Clever me, I reached over and pulled the cord. A red light came on, and the phone rang...”You have pulled the emergency cord, Susan, do you need help? Swami asked. Yes please come I shouted. The desk has a key and the guy came in, called 911 and I was saved. INCREDIBLE

Five people came to carry me out, one female and four guys...one of which may have been Angel Gabriel who is like a special friend. I'll tell you about that later. They were so wonderful and kind and full of good cheer...I enjoyed every minute of it.

Was admitted to Bay Front Hospital where I had been last year for pneumonia/. And I don't want to go on and on about how great it was but the people were so great. There were five guys gathered around my bed and they told me I had fluid on my knee and they were going to drain it. I asked if all these guys were going to hold me down while they did it and got a laugh. We had a great time. The main ER doctor numbed the knee and I did n't feel hardly anything. They kept saying...this is going to pinch a little. I said...it's Ok I'll pray. Almost no pain. Called my sister to come to get me and walked out. They removed 66 cc's of fluid. I'm suppose to go to our wellness clinic down stairs this morning. I don't want to have a knee replacement but I'm sure the doctors will want to do that as it seems to be hurting again but not so much. I think I'll just get one of those electric scooter chairs and carry on.

Oh and lesson learned. I spent one full much at Swami's Super Hospital when I had that cancer taken out of my back and it was very trans formative...in fact...I think I may have grown more spiritually during that time than any other time of my life. Every thing was Swami. The nurses were right out of heaven, the food cooked by devotees and even the other patients were all Swami. Well, Bayfront was the same way. The staff, both in the ambulance and in the ER were so cheerful and loving I felt I was back at Super. So how could I have had such great experiences? Well, of course, it was all Swami. I could have been taken to any other hospital by a group of any other people and had the same amazing time because...it was all Swami. So, why should we ever worry about anything?

So here I am with this bum knee and yet everything seems to be gathering steam in my life. First, the scary part. I retired from Social Work when I was 45 or something and I'm 77 now. Swami says we have been given this body to serve others and so in the back of my mind is this nagging thought...Kennedy's ask not what your country can do for you but...you know that one. I have no nursing skills or any other skills to help people...so at the ashram I wrote books for kids...that was my seva. I really wanted to volunteer in a hospital or old age home but in India,,,not possible for a white face. And here...no car, can't even walk very well so...then I realized...I'm living in an old age home!! So I was trying to figure a way to do some seva here. You know I'm friendly but these ladies just sit around with their pet doggies and visit all the time. They talk about 'ladies things' I guess, but...I never married, no children,,,not much in common besides I think it may have gotten around that I'm a Hindu. I haven't tried to hide it but I know some, or at least one lady doesn't want to be my friend because I am not a Christian. Well, of course I believe in Jesus Christ. I think that He saves people, crossing out the ego and letting it die on the cross! But so does the Buddha and so does our precious Swami....who said He didn't come here to start a religion. He came to show us the way to self realization. He came to teach us to love ourselves. And now that He's left the body that doesn't leave us much to CLING to...except ourselves. It ain't easy.

Where was I? Oh yes, there's a TV show on now...America's got talent. Now I think there's an 'India's got talent', 'An Australia's got talent and so forth. So I thought why not...'Peterborough's got talent'. We could entertain ourselves here in our old age home but whatever we do...do it together...So I put up a sign and in two days about 8 people are going to get together in the party room and...what? I don't have the foggiest. I've asked around...nobody else has the foggiest either so I'll let youall know. Reminds me of the time 25 years ago when they wanted to make me music director of the Christmas program. I almost had a nervous breakdown and begged Sylvia to do it and she's done it ever since. I will not have a nervous breakdown this time but OH GOD SWAMI HELP. Maybe I'll find another long white cord and someone will call 911.

But good things are happening too. I wrote a play for the drama Group across the street which has been accepted...about a bunch of old people learning to be happy being themselves instead of wanting to be young again. I'll let youall know about that too. And I'm singing at 'Country Classics' the old standard songs which are really love songs to Swami; I change the lyrics a little when I sing to Swami. I sing about His sidelong glance and the touch of His hand...in an interview and, of course His all encompassing love which we will never find in anyone else in this life time. I take out the lines about kissing even though I do kiss His picture...and about holding Him in our arms but you can include 'holding Him in our hearts' Don't laugh, I find these old standard ballads produce, at least in my heart, much more bliss than Sanskrit bhajans . I sit in my little flat here so far from my precious India, singing 'I'm gonna love you like nobody's loved you come rain or come shine' And the hours roll by and I'm blissfully in love with the Lord as I have been since the day I heard His name.

Look I know that this is much longer than any blog I've ever written but there are some other things I have to say...And I don't even know why.

A couple days ago an old old friend came over to see me. She is angry. She is very angry about our government, about Wall street, the banks, the congress etc. I don't see her much because I find it hard to be around so much negativity. I said that Swami said...don't worry, be happy...but that doesn't work for her. She thinks that she is supposed to be angry so she can fuel the fires of change. Of course the fact that she is not doing anything about making changes, doesn't seem to be important. She says she is too old to protest with the Occupiers. So she wants to leave the country and go back to her Himalayas... I suggested that she might find a little corruption there also but that didn't seem to be important. We are the land of the free, a democracy etc so...

Her visit was a little 'off-putting' and disruptive but...not so much that I couldn't handle it. Then yesterday I was reading my FaceBook and another old old friend posted a scathing article about India...the dowry system, 0ne million missing girls...how they abort the female fetuses etc. What bothered me mostly was that the person who wrote the U Tube was a somewhat prissy little white foreign lady who talked about all this stuff. For God's sake I wrote ten adventure books in India about a little girl Avatatr named Bala Devi who fought the dowry system. I know how bad it is, I know terrible stuff about Devi Dasas which made me give letter after letter to Swami begging for change. As a matter of face, the daughters of those Devi Dasas are now learning to be nursing aides in a school which has come up. But that's not the point.

The point is what do we do with these terrible social problems. And I don't have an answer. I hate this dowry system with all my heart and soul but I resent someone airing this on my FaceBook which goes out to so many foreigners...OK maybe not so many but anyway...it's India's problem. I remember once at the Ashram we had a huge gathering of Western NRIs They looked like very wealthy Indian doctors and their wives so, being all upset about dowry and Devi Dassas, I approached a few asking if they could help in any way. I got blank stares. But THEY are the ones to try to get involved not these white faces over here who can't possibly understand.

The Buddha says,,,avoid greed and anger. Swami says 'do good, be good' But does this help? It seems to me that Swami said...in so many words...worry about your own conduct. Keep your house is order. Change can only come one at a time. Each and every heart mus be purified of greed and anger, and then slowly slowly...Oh God what about the activists like my old friends. I'm writing stupid little plays about people finding peace in their old age and I'm trying to sew a little kindness around me. Am I helping? What should we do about the terrible mess all around us in this country? Shall we just sit and stew in our negative anger? Well it makes my blood sugar boil and then I'm no good to anyone but I guess maybe I've contributed my mite. Did my Bala books do any good. I don't know but at least I printed 10,000 copies begging for a change in the dowry system...maybe it enforced some good values somewhere. But I do resent these white foreigners preaching about my India even though my friend lives there. Let them complain about Wall street. At least that might conceivably help.