Travels with UG

February 13

U.G. and I are settled in the City of Garden Apartments, in two studios, half a block from each other. It's a rather large complex, quiet, convenient. Both studios have kitchens and we are using his for cooking and eating, and mine for computers and electronics. My computer and printer are spread out on the kitchen counter, neat and organized at last.

We arrived yesterday morning at 8 a.m. from Hong Kong, but couldn't check in until noon. So we left the bags and walked to the center of Melbourne, dropping off a role of film to be developed and shopping for food essentials in a large department store. We bought couscous, vermicelli pasta, several varieties of heavy cream and cheese (U.G. had told me in advance about the double and triple cream cheeses the Australians make), lime pickle, curry powder, cereal, rolls, instant coffee and the like.

Then we checked in, settling first in his room as it was ready, making lunch and sorting through luggage. Then at two, I checked into mine. U.G. likes his room best because it is darker, on the street near the action, such as it is. And I like mine because it is lighter, hidden off in the gardens, more private. Perfect. I did three loads of laundry, a relief after all this traveling. U.G. did one. I put his things in for him, got the machine running (after getting help from the Canadian maintenance man) and when I returned an hour later to put his wash in the dryer, it was already nearly finished. He is very independent, I'm never sure how much help he needs, though he has made it very clear to me that he will let me know what he wants, and does not want, done for him.

Melbourne seems clean and quiet, people are friendly and bland. The city seems bland as well, but restful. We are to stay here a week, then on to Sydney.

Here I am really alone with U.G. He knows nobody, nor do I, so we are thrown together. I counted up how many pages I had written about my time with him last night and there were 160 of them. I told him this at dinner and he commented on our having been together for five months already. That is really something when you think about it. Five months with a man like U.G., in this unique relationship.

What is strange to me is that in some ways I feel utterly at home with him, as if I had always known him, and in other ways terrified, awed and constantly on edge. I can take nothing for granted, at any moment I may be out on my own, sent away from him. He does nothing to make me feel secure, yet in a sense I do because I know he cannot do me (or anyone) any harm. This pull toward him is intense and total. Impersonal, I suppose, and yet there is something intimate about it as well. U.G. says not to name anything, not to try to understand.

Driving in from the airport in the taxi yesterday I realized that my thoughts are constantly in the past or the future, thus I am not seeing the present, not living. My mind is always scheming, plotting, rueing, evaluating, describing, naming. Never at peace, never one with what is happening. I see this but am helpless to change it.

On the trolley, on the way downtown, I told U.G. I had enjoyed listening to the interchange on the tape last night with Sarala, the one about, "If I am in the flow," and his saying, "Be the flow." U.G. said he couldn't have said, "Be the flow," because that implies becoming again, not what is. Just as I get attached to an idea, a phrase, he knocks it out.

He told me I could not listen to him, nor understand, no matter how hard I tried. Herein lies the hopelessness: I am with this sage who could tell me everything, yet I cannot hear him. I told him last night that I was getting used to the silences between us, that I didn't feel responsible for them anymore, as if they implied something wrong with me. I said I felt comfortable just being with him without talking.

He said that in his dialogues with people, one phrase, one sentence, one word should do it, no need for all this chatter.

Today was intense and there was something different between us. U.G. was in a jolly mood, much more forthcoming than usual, friendly and conversational. Perhaps it is being on vacation, not seeing people. I almost felt we were friends, easily chatting and joking about this and that. Almost. From time to time he would touch my arm in an amiable, light-hearted way, for emphasis, something he does easily with many people, but heretofore not with me. I felt there was some physical aversion to me on his part, but I don't feel it now, here. If there is some light physical contact, it seems natural.

We got into a strange dialogue in the street in Melbourne. Heading to Qantas to make travel reservations, I stopped in a travel agency to ask where the nearest Qantas office was. They gave me a number on Williams Street, running parallel to Elizabeth Street where we had gotten off the trolley. We walked across two blocks and then down Williams towards our destination. U.G. said we hadn't needed to double back, we could have stayed on Elizabeth and then cut over. I couldn't understand what he was talking about for the life of me, and kept insisting it was the same thing. He said he wasn't annoyed at me, nor criticizing me, just making a point.

I knew he wasn't criticizing me, but I just couldn't get his point, yet I wanted desperately to understand. I finally did, while we were sitting in Qantas. He showed me on the map, that if we had stayed on Elizabeth and crossed over later, we wouldn't have had to double back to Elizabeth after doing our business at Qantas! I saw his point, finally. We both agreed that if the travel agency had said Bourke and Williams, rather than the number on Williams we could have gone directly there.

It's impossible to explain this scenario. But there was great energy in the interchange, no ill will or fear on my part, just the desire to get it straight.

Afterwards we went to the post office and sent photos to Mariana and Bangalore and then returned to the hotel for lunch. The girl in the corner pharmacy who printed the pictures told me she is from Bangalore and she recognized U.G. from the photos. Just then he came into the store, so I introduced them. She asked him if he would come to their home, and he said he would.

I reheated the couscous and undercooked the peas. Last night U.G. had told me my pasta was perfect. Today he said he doesn't even like vegetables, but if he's going to eat them he would like to have the green cooked right out of them, till they turn yellow. Then he said he didn't think I'd be able to stand his diet, it was too repetitive. He said if he needed varieties of food, he would also need varieties of girls, it was the same thing. And he needs neither.

Living with him this closely makes me see just how precise his habits are. He eats just the amount and what he wants, no more no less, no deviation.

I said I thought I could live on his diet. That I would probably just eat more than he eats. We weighed ourselves on the street today and he was sixty-two kilos, I was fifty-eight. He said he had lost weight, probably in Hong Kong, all that eating! An old lady supervised our weighing and commented on my being too thin. U.G. said (to me) she was a do-gooder.

U.G. now makes his own breakfast and I come over around 8 for coffee, though that may stop. I don't know exactly how much he wants to see of me. He said today it was good to have me here to lock the door, carry things in my purse, things like that. What an effusive compliment! The slightest warmth or kindness melts my heart.

Am I completely crazy? As soon as dinner was over, I said goodnight and left. U.G. didn't even say goodnight (he thinks it's a ridiculous formality, like saying, "Excuse me," when you sneeze). Sometimes he says, "Nightie-night," if he's in a particularly cozy mood. But tonight, dead silence.

How easy it is to have expectations of continuity, of things being the same. I was already attached to the idea of being at ease with U.G., of having a different kind of relationship. But this is a beautiful example of how things change. He is like a will-o'-the-wisp, full of mood shifts, surprises. It is this that intrigues, fascinates, causes me to love him, yet also causes me frustration, fear and confusion.

We went back to Melbourne center after a rest and coffee. We had to wait over a half hour for the trolley for which we had each bought a ten-ride ticket. I asked U.G. if he ever feels impatient, restless and he said, "No. Why?" There is as much activity going on standing on the street corner as on the trolley or anywhere else. Wherever he is, he is occupied with seeing, hearing, he is perfectly content.

On the trolley he asked me if I was enjoying the trip, and he said that I was seeing more of the world than I had ever thought I would, that things happen this way, surprisingly. I said I was having a great time, that there was nowhere else in the world I wanted to be. I wanted to say, here with you, but held back. Why?

I said if I hadn't rented that video camera in Chicago none of this would have happened. Yes, he agreed and told me again that he had known over a year ago that someone would come along and take pictures, that Terry had tried to organize it, to raise money to do it himself, but U.G. had vetoed it.

U.G. should not travel alone and I would like to be with him as long as he'll let me be, camera work aside. I asked him about the static electricity on the plane and he said it was coming from me as much as from him.

Tonight I went over and cooked dinner, noodles and spaghetti sauce again. This time we ate in silence, the intimacy and camaraderie of the afternoon gone. I felt unsure again, de trop, like I was intruding. He asked me to help him select photos to send to various people, and he read me a letter to Bob and Paul in California, suggesting he may change travel plans and bypass the U.S. this spring, go to South America instead and the States in the fall. I am totally up for whatever he decides to do, as long as I am included in the plans! I said I didn't care if I ever went home.

I went to U.G.'s at 8:15 a.m. and the curtains were drawn, so I went to the corner store, bought papers and cream and worked a little in my room. Just before nine I went to his door again, and still the curtains were drawn. I knocked but there was no response. At ten I went again and this time the curtains were open and he was just finishing his cereal. He said he had been awakened by a call at 4 a.m. from India and had not been able to get back to sleep until 7.

I said I had been worried about him, not knowing whether he was sick or dead or what. He said he was in a deep sleep and had not heard me. I told him about a dream I had but he seemed disinterested. On the trolley to town he said we just dream to amuse ourselves, there is no meaning (he does not dream at all). I asked him again about coincidence, synchronicity and he said our minds create the connection, the meaning. There is no meaning in anything. This takes care of dreams, astrology, the I Ching, everything. I am being weaned from all my oracles and signs and portents. This is sort of like the reverse of Jungian therapy! Every concurrence there was "honored" and seen as a gift from the goddess. Here with U.G. it is seen as mere bunk, rubbish, refuse from a non-existent unconscious.

Last night he sank into samadhi the minute we arrived back at the apartment, or maybe he was just tired from the walk. I made dinner, potatoes and tomato sauce. He told me I was good at cooking for him and that pleased me. I am used to cooking quickly and repetitively, making the same thing over and over, so I guess I am well prepared for this routine. He said he won't bother cooking because I'm doing it so well.

He also said my messiness must be having an impact on him, that he is feeling lazy and his things are in disorder.

We shopped in stores around the center. I looked for shoes for U.G. to no avail but at least bought some white chocolate at one of the department stores. Also incense at an Indian shop. We went home for lunch, eating leftovers. Then a rest until four, during which time I redid my address book and offered to do his. I suggested renting a car and driving around the ocean and the mountains, but he was unenthusiastic and said maybe I should go sightseeing by myself. He asked me how I was driving on the left and I said it would not be a problem.

U.G. said Sydney is his kind of town, that he likes it more than Melbourne. I asked him why he came to Melbourne and he said for me, so I could see it. I was touched that he would create travel plans for my benefit. I am enjoying this time alone with him, though sometimes it is torturous. But that comes from my own mind trying to understand, trying to imbue the present with permanence. As we walked back downtown yesterday evening, I thought once again how I mar the present with worries about the future, with evaluations of the past. Now that I am seeing this fact, regularly and with clarity, will anything change?

We wandered for about two hours. All stores were closed but we looked in windows. U.G. seemed most interested in travel agencies, comparing air fares. I think he is mulling over the possibility of changing plans, but he hasn't said so. We walked to the bottom of Elizabeth Street and then took the tram home.



Went back to sleep for an hour before getting up. Dreamt that a wreck of a car was hovering, suspended, just overhead from where I was standing in a big city somewhere. It was going to fall and I was running, running towards shelter, wondering whether it would fall on me, whether I was going to die.

When I went to U.G.'s room this morning, he told me there had been an airplane crash in Bangalore yesterday, he had heard about it last night. Ninety people killed on an airbus from Bombay. And I distinctly felt when I woke up at 2 a.m. that he was awake and sending me some kind of message. He told me he had gotten up at 2 himself. But, according to U.G., this is all coincidence and has no meaning.

We had a sincere but awkward (from my position) talk this morning. He asked me once again, "What do you want?" I said I don’t know, but not enlightenment. He asked, "Are you sure of that?" God, I'm not sure of anything. I don't know who is talking or what is being said. I said I just wanted to be with him. I understood my misery came from clinging, trying to plot the future to guarantee against change, impermanence. I knew it was hopeless that I would ever go beyond this.

He said concerning detachment (vis-a-vis children and obligations) that you want to be detached because you are attached, it's as simple as that.

U.G. said I should eat what I want, buy olive oil and what I like to eat, that I need to eat more than he eats, I'm tall and a growing girl! I asked him why he said in Bangalore the person he would travel with would have to be sixty-four. He said that was Valentine's age and that he hadn't directed that towards me.

After dinner we went for a walk around the block. It was windy and we picked the least picturesque streets imaginable, typically! A great scene, walking through Melbourne's drab back streets talking about enlightenment, or more precisely what he came into. Is there no way out of fear, if fear is all we are, I asked. The way out of fear is death was the answer.

As we went by a man sanding in the street, a deafening noise, U.G. commented, "That's the Silence." I knew that.

I know what he is saying, I have heard it all. I just can't hear him, understand him. If I were to understand, I would die. If I were to become truly selfish (stop trying to be selfless), the one who is trying to be selfless would die as well. There is only the one death, no gradations. It's all or nothing.

What do I understand? Nothing.

I pointed out the sunset as we reached the last corner, knowing full well he would shrug with indifference. He did. I feel so much love for him.



I told U.G. Pluto goes retrograde tomorrow, in his fourth house, the home. He received this news in a friendly fashion. I told him I had dreamed about him last night, a continuation of the day, no separation between waking and sleeping.

He motioned me over to the chair next to him and taking my hand said he was giving me energy for courage. I accepted this gratefully and happily, no fear, no conflict. We talked a bit about palmistry, he showing me the lines of the mission on his hand, the death at age forty-nine, and explaining that, according to the traditions, if he didn't have a mission he would die within seventy-two hours.

My line showing a bad heart is, he said, even worse than having a butcher's heart. I am about to go back to pick him up, to put his things in the washing machine, deliver the paper and we're going briefly to Victoria Market.

It's a beautiful, cool and sunny morning and I am intensely alive. Last evening, we leave tomorrow. The market was interesting, though after two hours U.G. had enough and wanted to go home. I realized how tired he was, suddenly, and suggested we take a taxi. He rested for an hour before lunch and afterwards Peter and Kalyani Lawry, Bud's friends from yesterday afternoon, came with their two children and brought another couple and a psychotherapist, David Barthgate. In the evening Bud's ex-wife and a friend, a Naturopath, came as well. So the afternoon was full, and U.G. eloquent and impassioned.

I found myself asking him questions while they were there, questions I have heard the answers to before, but which provoke a response in him. It happened naturally, I guess it is fine. I have noticed others do this around him, Mahesh, Terry, for example. I used to think my questions too naive, banal to ask, was afraid of showing up my ignorance. But perhaps U.G. gave me courage this morning.

Speaking of courage, he mentioned that this transmission of energy is as bogus as the passing on of enlightenment. There is no way, he says, that he can pass on the life energy of which I am already a manifestation, as is everyone else in the world, and everything. So if there is any change of courage on my part it is merely the power of his suggestion, activating my own mind. This is what he says, and next moment he will negate this.

I am packing and doing laundry. This week has seemed long, not because it has been in any way boring, but because of the intensity of the time with U.G. I'm not sure things are any different than they were on arrival, except that various subjects have been brought up again and again and if not dealt with, at least explored. I feel easier with him, more natural, not so anxious to please. Therefore perhaps I am less paranoid about being abandoned, unwanted, not measuring up in some way.

To be able to help U.G. is my greatest desire, whatever it takes. I feel I am encountering all my tendencies in this regard, looking at them fully if not transcending them. All we are is fear, and if fear comes to an end we die, this is the message. So all this talk of courage is sentimental twaddle, that's what U.G. says. And I would have to agree.

I've enjoyed this time, though being alone with U.G. is far from easy. It's like being in front of a glaring, overly-lit mirror which enlarges every pore of illusion, every tendency flooding to the surface. Sometimes I feel like a floundering infant trying to make myself understood, only to understand there is no person there to understand me, and that non-person tells me there is no person in me either, only the ideas the culture has put there that I mistake for I.

We have eaten most of the leftovers. U.G. hates wasting food, and remains of it will be carried to Sydney. I would like to pay his hotel bill—either from the money I owe him, or anyway, just because I have more money than he does. But we'll see tomorrow.