We were met in Amsterdam by a crowd of U.G.'s friends. Getting into Robert's car, U.G. put his hand on my head to keep me from bumping it on the door, as if making amends for the outburst in Zurich. But there are no amends. As long as I place a premium on friendly moments and veer away from harsh ones, I will suffer. If I accept one on the same plane with the other, I won't be unhappy. If I have no investment in the outcome, I will be free.
My room looks out on the canal and the church tower which peals every quarter hour. Happy to be here and don’t know what is next!
A busy day yesterday. U.G. and I went for a walk in the morning, checking out the local department store. Later we went to visit Morari and Suveera in their apartment. Everyone brings U.G. his favorite Belgian chocolates, Leonidas.
In the evening U.G. told some people who stayed to ask questions, that it's not so much a question of throwing away your crutches, that you can walk, but that the crutches will just fall away on their own, the need for them will disappear; it never existed.
A long walk yesterday with U.G., Morari and Suveera. Willem de Ridder interviewed U.G. for cable tv in the afternoon, and in the evening for radio, live, from 10 to Midnight in a vaulted studio somewhere near here. Willem asked me a few questions at the end, and I felt shy and inarticulate, horrified by my banality. U.G. asked me afterwards how I can ask other people to do testimonials for me and then refuse to do them myself. A good point. I allowed my stage fright and inadequacy to rule me, felt ill equipped to speak about U.G. But why? I have spent a year with the man. Can't I talk about it? What’s wrong with me?
Most of the conversation centers around where we are going from here. U.G. asks Henk repeatedly, "How long am I staying in Amsterdam?," as if Henk has anything to do with the decision. He has visited countless airline offices, carried away flight schedules which he reads with attention whenever he gets a moment, he announced he is not going to Rome and flipped a coin yesterday about flying directly to Boston from here, or going to London first. London won, and he told me to call the apartment hotel and make a reservation.
He told me the other day that he is sinking more and more and wants to be in one place for the remainder of this month, does not want to travel. It's as if he senses that something is going to happen and he wants to be settled somewhere when it does. This possibly will be California.
We are going for drives with various people, Andre one day and Jerry the next, visiting dunes and dykes and beaches. We have walked all around Amsterdam, to post offices and department stores. It is a city for strolling, though going at U.G.’s pace seems tiring to some. Large groups come every evening and U.G. seems to be enjoying himself.
Yesterday U.G. and Andre were going to cook an Indian dinner but this turned into a fiasco as Andre doesn't cook. U.G. asked me to do all the preparations, cooking cauliflower and peas and rice for him. I did as he asked, but the vegetables became like porridge and the rice glutinous with over-cooking. Though U.G. monitored the whole thing, it was disgusting, barely edible, and he blamed me for messing it up. I don't know what he was up to because if he wants to cook he does, and to perfection. Something else was going on.
Morari, Suveera and I went to the Dawn Horse Bookstore and Au Bout du Monde yesterday afternoon. Looking at books make me see my entire history before my own eyes, psychology, A Course in Miracles, Zen, Advaita, Out of Body—everything, there it is, on shelf after shelf. U.G. said last night that it is only an assumption that we are the same person who lived twenty, ten, five years ago. These selective memories create the idea that we exist and did such and such which led to such and such. Yet nothing has anything to do with anything, separate frames.
Looking out the window I see only water and barges. Full moon.
I was thinking about the demolition of my personality and remembering in Paris nearly thirty years ago when I met S. and he told me I had no personality and had to develop one to operate in his world. Isn't this the root of everything? Surely I had a personality already, one formed by parents and upbringing. But it didn't suit S.'s view of how I should be, so in my accommodating way, I developed another one to cope with the life we were leading.
It is this combination of false personalities that is being attacked by U.G. An impulse that operates in him, that happens spontaneously. I have moments of feeling devoid of me and this personality that I have learned to know, and those moments are restful and problem-free. It feels like a kind of humility, an emptiness that allows me to hear what U.G. is saying, at least to some extent.
Negative this morning. Tos got annoyed at all the people hanging around just gaping at U.G. and perhaps it got to me too. I cook for seven or eight every meal, plus shopping. I can't understand why U.G. encourages it here in Amsterdam when he didn't in Gstaad.
Mahesh called in the evening and asked to talk to me after U.G. He said I am in for it in London, that with U.G., "If he is harsh, you don't have a chance, and if he is calm, you have had it!" He recommended just giving in to his harshness, not fighting it. I said I have no choice in the matter.
Robert told me I look spiritual to him and I asked him why. He said it is my eyes, my hair, the way I move, that it is a childlike-ness about my bearing, a saintly quality! Of all things! U.G. had mentioned the night before about spending 365 consecutive days with me and that I am the person who is always with him, and yet he cannot bring my face onto his computer screen. He said when I am not in front of him, I do not exist. He used this as an example of how he functions.
As he went to bed, I went up and told him about Tos and her cancer so he would know, perhaps be able to help her.
U.G. says he is going to rest in London, see few people. That is fine with me, though I sense it will be an intense time for me, once again. I have been so busy here and there have been many people around constantly, so there has been very little interchange between us. What there has been has been calm and peaceful, a danger zone according to Mahesh.
Well, in for a penny in for a pound. I have gotten this far. Whatever happens, it is not in my hands.
