September 18
The first thing U.G. said when he entered my apartment in New York was that he had come to stay for forty days and forty nights. (It had been raining heavily for several days and the air is still humid and overcast.)
~ ~
U.G. told me that he had been pickpocketed outside his hotel and someone took $95 out of his front pocket. He didn't seem upset, only impressed by the finesse of the thief, he wondered if the thief had x-ray eyes to see where the money was. He said it was the oddest sensation to feel a hand in his pocket, then look down at his own two hands and ask himself whose hand was in his pocket. He said the thief needed the money more than he did and he wished he could have taken him to lunch at a five-star restaurant to express his admiration. He said he likes people to use their talents and that the thief was a master at thieving and deserved what he got. U.G. says, "Steal, but don't get caught!"
~ ~
He went on to say there would be no starvation in the world if people who had money only kept what they needed and didn't hoard the rest.
U.G. asked me about the noise he had heard from his room and I said it was the air conditioner across the courtyard. I asked if its intermittent going off and on bothered him and he said not at all. All sound is the same for him. For U.G., the droning of the air conditioner is the same as Beethoven's "Ninth". Sound is not outside of him, but within.
At night he curls up in a fetal position and goes into a deep sleep, and then awakens a few minutes later; this pattern repeats itself all night. He sleeps very little and goes into a deep deathlike state once a day, which is particularly intense on the full and new moon.
~ ~
A visitor asked him "Who am I?" U.G.'s answer: "Why do you think you are anything other than who you already know you are—your body, your name? Why do you assume there is anything else to discover, to become?" He was amiable but made short shrift of every question about prayer: "Who are you praying to? God is just an idea." On food: "We think about food, what to eat, when we have given up all hope." Exercise: "Jogging, karate do violence to the body, are not necessary." Meditation: "Meditation is evil—only evil thoughts arise."
U.G. says illusion creates the idea of truth to perpetuate illusion. I told him I had taken down all the guru pictures in his room (my office), all my ex-teachers, Zen masters and a photo of him as well. He laughed and said there would therefore be less lizards on the walls. He has no patience with the devotional aspects of the guru-student relationship. He doesn't consider himself a teacher because, he says again and again, there is nothing to teach. I hope he can live with all my astrological books, but I don't know that he pays much attention to these things. He says he doesn't see the way we do, or as he did before his calamity. He sees movement, reflection of light, but without thought, without naming. He would not look at the shelves, for example, and say, "Books."
After the visitors left last night, U.G. told me more about his meeting with Ramana Maharshi and how his biographers had misunderstood the interchange. He had asked Ramana if what he had—enlightenment—he could give to him, U.G., and Ramana said yes, he could give it to him, but asked could he, U.G., take it? This interchange, according to the reports, sent U.G. off on an intense search, culminating in his 'Calamity' (when everything that mankind had thought felt and experienced was flushed out of his system leaving behind a smoothly functioning mechanism, devoid of thought). What U.G. really meant was that he was so shocked by the unblinking arrogance of that bastard, Ramana, telling him he had something to give him, but questioning his ability to take it, that it blasted the notion of transmission of enlightenment for him, ended it once and for all.
U.G. said if there was anybody who could take it, if it was there to be taken, it was him. Calling the great saint Ramana a bastard seems to be typical of U.G. He says Buddha was a crackpot, Jesus a misguided Jew, Freud a fraud, and so forth. He explodes all these myths of sanctity and sacredness. Andrew used to emphasize, over and over, respect for the teacher, the high-holiness of his teaching, and it began to feel false.
Outrageous as U.G. is, he is refreshing. Ingmar Bergman talked about killing the darlings, and this seems to be what U.G. is after, killing all hope of salvation or guidance from outside, killing, ultimately, even the attachment to him. Astrologically U.G. is a triple Cancer, ruled by the Moon, and nearly all his planets are in his twelfth and first houses.
While making coffee this morning, I found myself in a conversation with U.G. He was talking about Kim becoming a Jehovah's Witness, he who has been so close to U.G. for so many years. (U.G. told Kim the Bible is Communism yesterday. Kim is, according to U.G., a saint—not necessarily a compliment, coming from U.G.-and his parents were card-carrying Communists so the remark was well-aimed.) He made the point that you are your conditioning, that Kim is a do-gooder and that is his true nature. He said the desire to change your conditioning only creates another conditioning, and it is not freedom or enlightenment.
To U.G. all psychology is religion, justifying dogma is theology, and exchanging one value system for another is futile. The people around him just go on with their lives, doing whatever they do and being whoever they are. There is nothing he can give them in the way of solace or hope, there is no permanent state of bliss or happiness.
He said this kind of dialogue, standing in the middle of the kitchen floor, is the way he likes to relate to people. Something comes up, spontaneously, and then it’s over. No lectures, no formal dialogues, no interviews. This is a unique situation for me to be in and I can’t understand how or why it’s happening. U.G. would say there is no reason, except practicality, that there is no further meaning, no meaning to anything. He is so easy to talk to and non-judgemental that I feel a singular lack of self-consciousness, of my habitual sense of unworthiness, fear of asking dumb questions. This in itself is freeing.
U.G. likes to go out on the balcony and read the Hitachi sign that looms above Central Park South. There is another sign too, behind it, and the times and temperatures never agree. He laughs about this and comments on the weather report being wrong. He goes out to have a look at least a dozen times a day. He says he has never worn a watch in his life, nor owned one.
I told U.G. that I would be happy to put any of his clothes in the washing machine if he wanted. He said he likes to wash them himself by hand, a holdover from his spiritual days. Occult training! He said he washed his clothes even when he had four servants (when he was growing up). His grandmother told him the story of the man who was so afraid of thieves that he trained a dog to bark and the dog was as big as a horse, and when the thief actually came the dog didn't bark, and the man had to bark himself.
~ ~
Here's what struck me most about this morning's conversation in the kitchen: You must accept yourself and others as you and they are because they cannot and will not change, nor can you.
U.G. asked me to give him a computer lesson. He mastered it instantly and proceeded to write a letter to friends in Australia and Italy. The only hitch was when the screen went dark, he flicked the power off and on again and all his writing was erased. I said how sorry I was and he just shrugged it off and replied it didn't matter at all, he'd just write it again.
I enjoyed helping him with the letter as there are so few things he will let me do for him. He barely permits me to prepare him a cup of coffee and if I wash the pot in which he has made couscous and has left to soak, he says that he was going to wash it, a slight reproach. Fiercely independent, I think he doesn't want anyone to get too attached to him, and one does become attached if one is allowed to serve, particularly in a spiritual relationship, whatever that is. He would say it doesn't exist, that there is no difference between any aspects of human experience, they are all the same.
U.G.'s letter was impersonal and concerned mostly travel plans and comments on his finances. There is really no one there. He has nothing to hide, no secrets, nothing personal because there is simply no person to protect or represent. He says there is no original thought about anything.
I dropped U.G. off at Macy's so he could walk home. When he returned he said he didn't know where he had gone or what he had seen. He seemed very far off. I wondered if the upcoming new moon might be affecting his energy. He says he becomes dull and stupid at the new and full moon.
~ ~
U.G. said communication is impossible between two people and that a relationship based on sex is doomed. Leslie asked if being together for companionship would work. U.G. said that was alright, but that nothing is permanent and that each person is alone in his own world, that the two worlds cannot become a third world, the relationship, our world, that you cannot try to change the other person to turn them into the culturally implanted vision of perfection, what you think the person should be like for you to be happy.
Last night U.G. and I made dinner after a group of people had left, a naturopath from Seattle, his wife and a Rajneesh divorcee (U.G.'s expression for defectors) who had met U.G in Bombay. I expressed my awe at the sheer volume of his talk with people, the tireless repetition of his message. He laughed at the thought of how much space would be filled with these billions of words. And he says it's all for nothing. He talks because people come to him, but he has nothing to say that can help.
I asked U.G. how he felt last night sitting around the living room with my daughter and her friends. They had posed polite questions for a while and then out of shyness proceeded to talk between themselves about people they knew, but U.G. and I didn't. Normally I would have felt this was somewhat rude and as he looked a little bored I was curious, even though he has said many times that he doesn't know whether he is bored or happy or unhappy. He emphasized this again in response to my question. He said he was listening to them talk and was interested in what they were saying, in the sense that it was sound and that what is outside of himself he experiences as inside, so there is no external conversation. It is all the same for him. When the conversation was over and they left, he said, he went to his room. As there was no further stimulus, he went to sleep. There is nothing personal about any of this, just a response to stimulus or lack of it.
It is not possible to imagine what it would be like to live this way, in the natural state, as he calls it, devoid of feelings, thoughts. Sometimes it is also not so easy to relate to someone who is in this state if you are not. Maybe you just have to learn to trust what you see and not second-guess motives nor look for hidden meaning. There is nothing hidden about U.G., or is there? I don't know.
In A&S department store, U.G. was interested in everything, checking fabrics and prices, but he wandered off in a disconcerting way or lagged behind. I found it hard to relate to him. This is the thing: There is no responsive personality there. Silence is a natural state for him even though he also likes to talk. So if one is habitually used to social convention, response and confirmation, one is left with a discomforting feeling of no-ground.
I am more used to him and his ways now, and am therefore more relaxed. I don't see him as a high holy man who requires special treatment. I am struck at how odd it is that I can feel such complete ease and simplicity with him. This is because of the way he is.
In the evening Kim and I made a combined dinner of rice and pasta with tomato sauces. Kim tried to explain to me where he is coming from in his devotion to the Bible, why he feels it speaks the truth. He cited the passage from Corinthians, "I bring not peace but a sword," to explain why the world is constantly at war or on the verge thereof, saying there is a day of judgement principle at work, that it is God's way of dealing with Evil.
U.G. was in his room for part of this conversation, then came out and leaned against the wall in the kitchen listening with a glum look on his face. Finally he exploded, "Kim, what do you think? Don't quote me the Bible and other old opinions, what is your truth?"
Rene arrived at 10 a.m., full of energy, here for a day or two. Also full of questions about U.G.'s chart. We talked a little bit about his Pluto-Mars square and he said he had been violently self-critical, harsh on himself when he was a young man, and that this harshness was reflected in his relations with his family and others. I told him Andrew had called him a cynic with a broken heart and he shrugged it off as he does all aspersions, he is so used to them. Also there is no one there to be hurt or insulted. Or is there?
With some visitors the subject arose again of this natural state and how much energy is released when you give up the hopeless and useless effort to become someone other than who you are, to improve yourself. The frustration at trying to do the impossible, whether striving for enlightenment or social or personal betterment or whatever, uses all your strength.
How handsome and graceful U.G. is, and how spare. He is generous with his time and utterly focused on his guests, uncompromising in his answers, leaving them no ground on which to rest and yet knowing the exact moment when their dialogue must come to an end. Then he says, "Thank you very much for coming," shakes hands and the interview is over. Nothing sloppy or indefinite.
~ ~
U.G. seems very well now. He is adversely affected by hot weather, particularly in India. He said he gets sick easily and often but recovers almost immediately. His organism is extraordinarily sensitive. How he survives on his diet is amazing! He has consumed six pints of heavy cream in less than four days. Everything he eats is white—cereal (oatmeal), pasta, couscous, cream, sugar!
~ ~
U.G. told me his body generates so much electricity he has to wear 100% cotton socks because synthetics generate static. He shops mostly at J.C. Penney or K Mart. He said Parveen Babi, the Indian movie star who used to spend a lot of time with him, bought him clothes, and he still wears the Gucci loafers she insisted he have. Someone else bought him clothes in Italy and he immediately gave away those what he had in his small suitcase.
Yesterday I drove U.G. and Kim up to Mt. Washington to see the leaves. Perhaps it was too long a drive because it was the day of the new moon and U.G. was feeling washed out. When we arrived at the summit, I said there was a wonderful view from the top and he agreed to go. It became apparent that it was a struggle for him, walking over the rocks in his leather-soled loafers, but he was, as always, charming and at ease. We never made it completely to the summit, but paused to see the whole of Connecticut and Massachusetts.
I took some photographs of him, U.G. looking very serious. He mentioned how many thousands of photos have been taken of him over the years, how he is still waiting for the photo, whatever that means. I mentioned later how serious he had looked posing for the photos, and he said, "One thing is sure, the photo will not be smiling. I don't know what a smile is. When I look in the mirror I never smile."
We stopped in Sharon, Connecticut at a shopping center to buy a few things for a snack as U.G. doesn't like going into restaurants. We had a picnic on the hood of the car right in the parking lot, standing up, in front of the supermarket. I suggested finding a more picturesque location for our picnic, and U.G. said emphatically that this was picturesque enough.
~ ~
I felt he was in an odd mood anyway yesterday, certainly having to do with the moon. He was mostly silent, except to blast at Kim regarding his attachment to the Bible. He was quite heated about that stinking God, and the damned Bible that was the cause of all the misery in the world.
Yesterday was odd and U.G. seemed a bit withdrawn. He was gone for hours and returned with his travel reservations made for California, Singapore, Hong Kong and Madras. He is leaving here on the 29th and will then spend three weeks in California. He will have been here, he says, forty days and forty nights, as he had promised on arriving.
In the evening, late, a young man showed up who U.G. said was a cocaine addict, or had been, that he was very hopped up. He came bearing halvah and a chocolate cake from Zabar's, which U.G. turned over to me and I will use for my daughter's birthday this weekend.
~ ~
I mentioned to U.G. just before we turned in, in response to Rene's comments about his big toe being unusual, that Terry had said he had the thirty-two signs of the Buddha. U.G. laughed and said Terry is crazy.
Today he was wearing a white L.L. Bean type fatigue sweater and his chinos from Italy. Aiden bought some flowers (though U.G. says if you want flowers, go outside and look at them in the field, why should they be cut down for your pleasure?) and we left him waiting for some other visitors in good spirits.
All Thursday morning was spent in dialogue with Rene and U.G. about his past life. Hugely interesting, both astrologically and as background to his present condition. For instance, U.G. said that when he was seven he decided that praying to an outside God (he had heretofore made coconut offerings to the monkey god Hanuman) was unnecessary, that the power to affect the outcome of a situation, e.g. whether his grandparents would travel with him to a Theosophical meeting away from home, was dependent on his own will. If he wanted something to happen enough, it would, without Hanuman, and after that the gods and goddesses went out of his system.
U.G. talked about the year of madness that he spent on the streets of London, prior to meeting Valentine. No, he said, it was not some sort of dark night of the soul. It was just a perverse time in his life and he had realized one day he simply would not live that way for another minute. That is when he sought temporary shelter and editing work at the Ramakrishna Center in London.
~ ~
S. met U.G. before he and I went out to lunch yesterday. He told him about his trips to India, all six or seven of them, always covering wars or funerals, Shastri's and Nehru's. U.G. asked him if he thought I would like India. I have been making vague plans to go this winter as U.G. invited me to visit him in Bangalore. I said, "He doesn't know me anymore," and U.G. said, "He knows you well enough to know whether you would like India or not." S. said it all depends on the reason for going and we all agreed there was so much to see how could you not like it.
U.G. is endlessly patient and relaxed with people. He comes and goes but sits and listens if he has nothing to say and seems content just to be present. He answers questions about the origin of life and the universe with counter-questions, "Why do you want to know?" and "What difference does it make?"
I am increasingly attached to U.G. which I know is useless as he is leaving in two weeks but it probably won't be out of sight out of mind. I don't know what it is about him, except that there is just a certain charm and graciousness, the most extraordinary smile. He says he is not smiling, that it is in reaction to you, that you draw everything out of him, he is a kind of mirror.
I do not know what I believe. Sometimes I think I don't have any beliefs of my own. U.G. might say this is true of everyone, that no one has an original thought. For myself I can only say that I feel that behind the nihilism in U.G.'s message is the very immensity that he denies. I can feel this in his presence and cannot even put words to it. Projection or not on my part, I feel this is right. He says he has no devotees, only friends, and that his friends just feel better around him. This is true. Everything seems simpler, clearer. I am not necessarily happy, but I enjoy being busy and helping him by copying tapes and the like.
~ ~
U.G. is an iconoclast, a debunker . He is even debunking the myths that have grown up in his own case, like the dark night of the soul. Terry seems to be responsible for much of this myth-making. I see in myself my tendency to deify U.G., to create a hero. Because to be housing a hero, a great man, would be more exciting, more worthwhile than just an ordinary man, which is what he claims he is. To see this is to let things be simple.
Rene left in the morning and tried to kiss U.G. goodbye. He sidestepped her and dodged away. Part of his background, no doubt. Once again I was struck by his utter ease and gracefulness at handling any situation that comes along.
Sunday night U.G. had sat up quite late with Luna and me, talking about the physical nature of his condition, his Calamity. He said, as he has said before, that it is absolutely and categorically impossible for a person who has gone through the enlightenment process to have sex, that there is simply one and no other and therefore no way, that making love requires two. There is no build-up, no tension. The ending of thought ends the whole thing. Also he talked about there being no one home behind the eyes, that the eyes do not focus on you.
This latter point was particularly noticeable to me as I sat next to U.G. in the car, waiting for Kim to make deliveries. We chatted away about this and that, but as he looked at me, I felt again and again the utter impersonality of his regard. As he looks me in the eyes, it is as if he does not really see me at all, or rather sees through me. Nothing registers, yet he is completely there and not there at the same time, if that makes any sense. I feel both completely at ease and at the same time slightly unnerved, exuberant and tired. Paradox.
At one point driving through Times Square, U.G. looked up at the grey assortment of skyscrapers looming from the window and said, "New York City is breathtaking," and went on to elaborate that when you look at it, you take a deep breath.
~ ~
U.G.'s Calamity centered around the reactivation of the thymus gland, the gland which is active in childhood in everybody but becomes dormant at puberty. When reactivated in this way in his case, it is where real feeling and response to life reside.
I dropped U.G. off at a travel agency on Thirty-Eighth Street and drove uptown via Madison Avenue. In front of Timberland I saw a parking place and feeling it was a sign, an omen, I took it. With Ed's encouragement about shoes for the guru ringing in my ears, I went in and bought a pair of soft moccasins for U.G., guessing at the size—his feet looked to be about the size of my own, though wider and more beautifully formed.
When he arrived home I showed him the shoes, hoping he wouldn't be offended at a gift from me. But not at all, he was very matter of fact, trying them on (a size too small) and not sure about the laces being an annoyance. We postponed a visit from a Jungian analyst for a half hour and took a taxi across the park. U.G. looked at all the various models of moccasins and loafers and finally decided he liked the model I had bought, but in a larger size. I noticed a particular gentleness in the salesman as he treated U.G. with kindness and attention. It was as if he felt there was something unique about this small man with his definite ideas about what he liked and what he didn't.
We left the store and decided to walk home through Central Park, U.G. wearing his new shoes and carrying the Gucci loafers in a Timberland shopping bag. As we reached the zoo, U.G. impulsively dumped the shopping bag containing the Guccis in the trash can, saying, "The right person will find these—I don't need them anymore now that I have new ones."
He elaborated further as we walked home that whenever he gets something new, he gets rid of something old. And since he is always being given new things, he is always giving away perfectly good, practically new clothes. He said he only likes to travel with one pair of shoes, the one on his feet because he doesn't want to carry shoes in his suitcase. He also said he liked the pair I had bought him because they were comfortable and soft ("How I've been torturing myself in those Guccis!") and because they weren't the most expensive, wouldn't last too long, a reminder to me of his stance on impermanence. I was very glad he accepted the shoes and was charmed by the disposal of the Guccis.
Suzanne S. came to see U.G. in the evening. While we were waiting for him, she told me about James Hillman in Paris saying the time had come for therapists to go out into the world and not stay isolated in consulting rooms. A few minutes later, U.G. came into the room saying the same thing, that the time for analysis is over, it is no longer appropriate. He also told Suzanne, in answer to her query about how he found Jung when he met him years ago in Switzerland, that Jung was a crazy mixed up kid! She took it all with equanimity and seemed to enjoy the dialogue.
The night of the San Francisco earthquake U.G. was glued to the television. We watched together for several hours. I was struck by the impassive nature of his watching, detached interest, no comments, no opinions, no emotions. He said if he had been there, he would have just been one with the earthquake. The next day and subsequent days there have been endless calls from all over the world, making sure that he, U.G., wasn't somehow out there and perhaps affected adversely by the earthquake. He had talked to all his friends in Marin County and it appears no one was particularly bothered one way or the other. He will go to California after Chicago to check out the rubble and see his friends.
U.G. mentioned that living with someone is really living their life, not your own and I saw immediately what he meant. So much energy went into concern with A.'s needs and desires, trying to please him, to keep him happy and therefore here (so I wouldn't have to be alone), that I lost touch with my own rhythms and needs. Not that I didn't like being with him, but I see that the small things like waking up and reading in bed, or talking on the phone in privacy, or not eating meals on a schedule were simply denied me during those months together. And I never questioned it. The truth is, as I drove away from the airport after dropping him off, I was suddenly filled with an glorious sense of freedom and lightness, relief, not sad at all.
U.G. asked me point blank the other day what I was doing in this big house with the children grown up and gone away. I kept trying to push the question into the future, but I see that he was showing me that I fill the house in an attempt to fill the abyss of loneliness, rather than facing it. He sees, obviously, that there is constant coming and going here, that I am never alone. He points things out to me in subtle ways and I am able to process the suggestion later on.
For example, when Jerry Gould came from Chicago to see U.G., he ended up inviting both of us, U.G. and me, to his home so he could introduce U.G. to some people in Chicago. We both accepted. The next day, I started to question whether I should go, going into my usual ambivalent mental routine regarding trips. He just put the issue to sleep for me by saying I had made the spontaneous decision to go, why question it, just go. So simple.
~ ~
U.G. likes certain metaphors, particularly now he likens the natural human energy, unencumbered by thought, to Hurricane Hugo, the most recent of autumn storms. Hugo is in fashion with him, as is the simile of hearing your own voice echoing on a trans-Atlantic call being the same as thought reflecting back on itself through relationship to others, something which is in fact, according to U.G., impossible. He says we all live in our own conditioned worlds of ideas and cannot communicate with anyone else about anything.
Last night Werner Engel, an eighty-eight year-old gentleman who lives in my building and was the first Jungian analyst in New York, came to visit U.G. He is a friend of Irena Tweedie's, the Sufi teacher in London and we had exchanged brief interchanges over the years about the Jung Foundation (of which I was a trustee), flying saucers, his health, the weather, and other items. But really I never had any idea he was as erudite or brilliant as he turned out to be. He had no preparation for U.G., nor U.G. for him.
The two polar opposite positions—Werner representing the possibility of growth, transformation, self-knowledge, appreciation of pleasure and joy, and U.G. denying all that, including not only the unconscious but consciousness itself, the Self, and the psyche—were presented with the precision and beauty of a perfect ballet (or tennis match, as Werner called it). They treated each other with the utmost respect and deference, and truly it seemed as if there was a kind of glow. U.G. would debunk everything I have said. But he did say that Werner was a most extraordinary man for his age, such a perfect memory, so interesting. And the humility of both of them, saying what an honor it had been and how much they had each learned from the other. Incredible.
I saw a new dimension to U.G., as I do nearly every day now. I felt sure that he could have destroyed Werner's position, but U.G. ended the dialogue at a point where Werner still had ground on which to stand, that is his belief structure, that he, Werner, preferred his place to U.G.'s defended fortress. But U.G. said there is no fortress, as there is nothing to defend or define. At the elevator door as he was leaving, Werner admitted to me that U.G. was right, but that he, Werner, had to believe in the possibility of transformation or his whole life's work would have been of no value. I was touched by the encounter.
When I said last night after Werner left that it would be wonderful to recreate the interview on videotape, U.G. said shortly, "Why recreate anything?" And I felt chastened and a bit silly. I'm always trying to hold onto things, to not let go. U.G. says it is hopeless, that we are incapable of throwing away old clothes let alone our opinions and thoughts and ideas.
~ ~
U.G. has seemed to be ambivalent about leaving New York, but he tells me it is not as it appears, that he's not undecided, but merely that the computer hasn't made a final printout on his plans yet. He says there is often a rogue factor that pushes the final decision into focus.
Last days in New York before Chicago. U.G. reminds me of an advertisement for The Accidental Tourist. This morning he brought out his new suitcase to show me what he says he could travel around the world with. Very small, with neat compartments. He bought it yesterday (very expensive, $159 reduced to $79) with Harry's combined birthday and Christmas (in advance) checks. He and Kim sent off cartons to Switzerland and California with books, tapes and extra clothes. I suggested U.G. leave some of his clothes here so he would have them next time he came to New York, and said this also might insure his return. "I wouldn't come back for clothes," he rejoined. But admitted that he hadn't got New York out of his system as yet, maybe he will return in the spring.
Attention to detail: He carries just three pair of pants, three shirts and a pair of white Calvin Klein long underwear which he uses as pajamas but says he will have copied in India. One pair of shoes, the Timberlands which now are without laces. U.G. says he will have some leather put on in California to cover the brass holes where the laces were. He says he never puts shoes in his suitcase, so one pair is all he ever allows himself. Oh, to be able to live in such a light manner, to be so unattached. So unencumbered.
A group of people came last night to see U.G., among them B who seemed pretty whacked out to me. This morning U.G. told me, "Your friend is finished. She needs medication, not therapy." He referred to Suzanne's comments about the side effects of drug therapy and added that it's better to have the side effects than suicide. He seems to see right into people.
~ ~
U.G. answers questions about the origin of life and the universe with counter-questions, "Why do you want to know?" and "What difference does it make?"
~ ~
My mother came to meet U.G. for a night and a day. She beat a hasty retreat, I think, saying she felt uneasy around him, charming and unique though he is. Clearly, her strategies for communicating don't work with him because he doesn't operate on a personal level. "Are you an animal lover?" she asked U.G. in an attempt to engage him in conversation. "I myself am an animal," he answered her. "I don’t even love human pets!"
He said to me after she left, "Your mother is a very tough cookie!" This is the truth. He also said it was very good that she is as independent of me as she is, my being an only child and all. I was glad to hear this because I sometimes think her fierce independence is her undoing, her inability to relate except on the most superficial level.
The cats are going wild with the impending departures. U.G emphasized again this morning how psychic they are and how much they know, not in any spiritual sense.
Chicago was momentous. I loved traveling on the plane with U.G. Part of the time, it was as if we didn't even know each other, very detached. And yet I felt safe and excited to be with him.
Jerry and Katharine met us at the airport and took us to their apartment overlooking the lake and Lincoln Park. The three days went by very quickly. One day U.G.'s granddaughter, Kusuma, who lives in Waukegan came with her husband and the three of us drove around Chicago and later she made poori bread and showed us how to do it.
~ ~
U.G. and I were walking past a camera store when I saw a sign saying video cameras for rent. Suddenly the idea to rent one popped into my head and I acted on it, with U.G. looking on. I realized I have been missing something incredible. Why didn't I get one in New York while he was there? The range is fantastic after stills and it opens a whole new world.
Two episodes with U.G. particularly stand out. On the way in from the airport we were talking about driving across the country and I said, "I would love to drive you!" and he took my hand and said, "Thank you!" Then he qualified the moment, explaining that had been an emotion in a frame, and then it was over.
The same thing happened as we were walking around Chicago. We went all the way to his old apartment building on South Michigan Avenue one day where he had lived married when his children were young. He was full of memories and anecdotes, about Mr. Dixon the old man who came to see him every day and gave him some of his retirement income to live on, and the woman with whom he had the infamous one night stand, and his marriage, and emotional non-existent emotional life. We walked and walked and at one point he said he was having a good time in Chicago and I was helping make it that way. It was almost personal, but just as he said, the moment passed and the emotion was erased, forgotten.
U.G. said he wished I could travel around the world with him with a video camera and that immediately planted the thought in my head that this is just what I would like to do.
~ ~
U.G. let me cook for him, something he has not let happen before. A few of Jerry’s friends came to see him, and a couple of mine. I realized I had no time to see anyone else, I was completely focused on him, much more so than I was in New York. I also kept dropping things, breaking Jerry’s favorite cup and a plate, very strange.
Something has shifted. I got sick the last day, coming down with the flu, sore throat and fever. On the flight back to New York, U.G. read my palm and told me I don't know my own heart and that I am level headed and creative. When we reached New York, I thought it would be easier for him to go back into the city and wait for his San Francisco flight there, rather than at Kennedy. I drove him back to the airport three hours later.
~ ~
He said goodbye, shook hands and was off. I asked U.G. whether I would need to get shots for India. "Oh no," he said. "We’re not worried about your germs there!"
~ ~
I had already decided to go see him in California. The next morning at 6, U.G. called from Mill Valley, to say he had arrived, was fine, and to find out how I was. He said he had talked to Moorty and had told him that as far as he is capable of being sentimental, he was, which of course is not at all. I felt very touched. That week I called him or he called me nearly every day. I decided to go once I got over the flu and bought my ticket.
~ ~
U.G. told me that he had been pickpocketed outside his hotel and someone took $95 out of his front pocket. He didn't seem upset, only impressed by the finesse of the thief, he wondered if the thief had x-ray eyes to see where the money was. He said it was the oddest sensation to feel a hand in his pocket, then look down at his own two hands and ask himself whose hand was in his pocket. He said the thief needed the money more than he did and he wished he could have taken him to lunch at a five-star restaurant to express his admiration. He said he likes people to use their talents and that the thief was a master at thieving and deserved what he got. U.G. says, "Steal, but don't get caught!"
~ ~
He went on to say there would be no starvation in the world if people who had money only kept what they needed and didn't hoard the rest.
U.G. asked me about the noise he had heard from his room and I said it was the air conditioner across the courtyard. I asked if its intermittent going off and on bothered him and he said not at all. All sound is the same for him. For U.G., the droning of the air conditioner is the same as Beethoven's "Ninth". Sound is not outside of him, but within.
At night he curls up in a fetal position and goes into a deep sleep, and then awakens a few minutes later; this pattern repeats itself all night. He sleeps very little and goes into a deep deathlike state once a day, which is particularly intense on the full and new moon.
~ ~
A visitor asked him "Who am I?" U.G.'s answer: "Why do you think you are anything other than who you already know you are—your body, your name? Why do you assume there is anything else to discover, to become?" He was amiable but made short shrift of every question about prayer: "Who are you praying to? God is just an idea." On food: "We think about food, what to eat, when we have given up all hope." Exercise: "Jogging, karate do violence to the body, are not necessary." Meditation: "Meditation is evil—only evil thoughts arise."
U.G. says illusion creates the idea of truth to perpetuate illusion. I told him I had taken down all the guru pictures in his room (my office), all my ex-teachers, Zen masters and a photo of him as well. He laughed and said there would therefore be less lizards on the walls. He has no patience with the devotional aspects of the guru-student relationship. He doesn't consider himself a teacher because, he says again and again, there is nothing to teach. I hope he can live with all my astrological books, but I don't know that he pays much attention to these things. He says he doesn't see the way we do, or as he did before his calamity. He sees movement, reflection of light, but without thought, without naming. He would not look at the shelves, for example, and say, "Books."
After the visitors left last night, U.G. told me more about his meeting with Ramana Maharshi and how his biographers had misunderstood the interchange. He had asked Ramana if what he had—enlightenment—he could give to him, U.G., and Ramana said yes, he could give it to him, but asked could he, U.G., take it? This interchange, according to the reports, sent U.G. off on an intense search, culminating in his 'Calamity' (when everything that mankind had thought felt and experienced was flushed out of his system leaving behind a smoothly functioning mechanism, devoid of thought). What U.G. really meant was that he was so shocked by the unblinking arrogance of that bastard, Ramana, telling him he had something to give him, but questioning his ability to take it, that it blasted the notion of transmission of enlightenment for him, ended it once and for all.
U.G. said if there was anybody who could take it, if it was there to be taken, it was him. Calling the great saint Ramana a bastard seems to be typical of U.G. He says Buddha was a crackpot, Jesus a misguided Jew, Freud a fraud, and so forth. He explodes all these myths of sanctity and sacredness. Andrew used to emphasize, over and over, respect for the teacher, the high-holiness of his teaching, and it began to feel false.
Outrageous as U.G. is, he is refreshing. Ingmar Bergman talked about killing the darlings, and this seems to be what U.G. is after, killing all hope of salvation or guidance from outside, killing, ultimately, even the attachment to him. Astrologically U.G. is a triple Cancer, ruled by the Moon, and nearly all his planets are in his twelfth and first houses.
While making coffee this morning, I found myself in a conversation with U.G. He was talking about Kim becoming a Jehovah's Witness, he who has been so close to U.G. for so many years. (U.G. told Kim the Bible is Communism yesterday. Kim is, according to U.G., a saint—not necessarily a compliment, coming from U.G.-and his parents were card-carrying Communists so the remark was well-aimed.) He made the point that you are your conditioning, that Kim is a do-gooder and that is his true nature. He said the desire to change your conditioning only creates another conditioning, and it is not freedom or enlightenment.
To U.G. all psychology is religion, justifying dogma is theology, and exchanging one value system for another is futile. The people around him just go on with their lives, doing whatever they do and being whoever they are. There is nothing he can give them in the way of solace or hope, there is no permanent state of bliss or happiness.
He said this kind of dialogue, standing in the middle of the kitchen floor, is the way he likes to relate to people. Something comes up, spontaneously, and then it’s over. No lectures, no formal dialogues, no interviews. This is a unique situation for me to be in and I can’t understand how or why it’s happening. U.G. would say there is no reason, except practicality, that there is no further meaning, no meaning to anything. He is so easy to talk to and non-judgemental that I feel a singular lack of self-consciousness, of my habitual sense of unworthiness, fear of asking dumb questions. This in itself is freeing.
U.G. likes to go out on the balcony and read the Hitachi sign that looms above Central Park South. There is another sign too, behind it, and the times and temperatures never agree. He laughs about this and comments on the weather report being wrong. He goes out to have a look at least a dozen times a day. He says he has never worn a watch in his life, nor owned one.
September 22
I told U.G. that I would be happy to put any of his clothes in the washing machine if he wanted. He said he likes to wash them himself by hand, a holdover from his spiritual days. Occult training! He said he washed his clothes even when he had four servants (when he was growing up). His grandmother told him the story of the man who was so afraid of thieves that he trained a dog to bark and the dog was as big as a horse, and when the thief actually came the dog didn't bark, and the man had to bark himself.
~ ~
Here's what struck me most about this morning's conversation in the kitchen: You must accept yourself and others as you and they are because they cannot and will not change, nor can you.
September 25
U.G. asked me to give him a computer lesson. He mastered it instantly and proceeded to write a letter to friends in Australia and Italy. The only hitch was when the screen went dark, he flicked the power off and on again and all his writing was erased. I said how sorry I was and he just shrugged it off and replied it didn't matter at all, he'd just write it again.
I enjoyed helping him with the letter as there are so few things he will let me do for him. He barely permits me to prepare him a cup of coffee and if I wash the pot in which he has made couscous and has left to soak, he says that he was going to wash it, a slight reproach. Fiercely independent, I think he doesn't want anyone to get too attached to him, and one does become attached if one is allowed to serve, particularly in a spiritual relationship, whatever that is. He would say it doesn't exist, that there is no difference between any aspects of human experience, they are all the same.
U.G.'s letter was impersonal and concerned mostly travel plans and comments on his finances. There is really no one there. He has nothing to hide, no secrets, nothing personal because there is simply no person to protect or represent. He says there is no original thought about anything.
I dropped U.G. off at Macy's so he could walk home. When he returned he said he didn't know where he had gone or what he had seen. He seemed very far off. I wondered if the upcoming new moon might be affecting his energy. He says he becomes dull and stupid at the new and full moon.
~ ~
U.G. said communication is impossible between two people and that a relationship based on sex is doomed. Leslie asked if being together for companionship would work. U.G. said that was alright, but that nothing is permanent and that each person is alone in his own world, that the two worlds cannot become a third world, the relationship, our world, that you cannot try to change the other person to turn them into the culturally implanted vision of perfection, what you think the person should be like for you to be happy.
Last night U.G. and I made dinner after a group of people had left, a naturopath from Seattle, his wife and a Rajneesh divorcee (U.G.'s expression for defectors) who had met U.G in Bombay. I expressed my awe at the sheer volume of his talk with people, the tireless repetition of his message. He laughed at the thought of how much space would be filled with these billions of words. And he says it's all for nothing. He talks because people come to him, but he has nothing to say that can help.
I asked U.G. how he felt last night sitting around the living room with my daughter and her friends. They had posed polite questions for a while and then out of shyness proceeded to talk between themselves about people they knew, but U.G. and I didn't. Normally I would have felt this was somewhat rude and as he looked a little bored I was curious, even though he has said many times that he doesn't know whether he is bored or happy or unhappy. He emphasized this again in response to my question. He said he was listening to them talk and was interested in what they were saying, in the sense that it was sound and that what is outside of himself he experiences as inside, so there is no external conversation. It is all the same for him. When the conversation was over and they left, he said, he went to his room. As there was no further stimulus, he went to sleep. There is nothing personal about any of this, just a response to stimulus or lack of it.
It is not possible to imagine what it would be like to live this way, in the natural state, as he calls it, devoid of feelings, thoughts. Sometimes it is also not so easy to relate to someone who is in this state if you are not. Maybe you just have to learn to trust what you see and not second-guess motives nor look for hidden meaning. There is nothing hidden about U.G., or is there? I don't know.
In A&S department store, U.G. was interested in everything, checking fabrics and prices, but he wandered off in a disconcerting way or lagged behind. I found it hard to relate to him. This is the thing: There is no responsive personality there. Silence is a natural state for him even though he also likes to talk. So if one is habitually used to social convention, response and confirmation, one is left with a discomforting feeling of no-ground.
I am more used to him and his ways now, and am therefore more relaxed. I don't see him as a high holy man who requires special treatment. I am struck at how odd it is that I can feel such complete ease and simplicity with him. This is because of the way he is.
In the evening Kim and I made a combined dinner of rice and pasta with tomato sauces. Kim tried to explain to me where he is coming from in his devotion to the Bible, why he feels it speaks the truth. He cited the passage from Corinthians, "I bring not peace but a sword," to explain why the world is constantly at war or on the verge thereof, saying there is a day of judgement principle at work, that it is God's way of dealing with Evil.
U.G. was in his room for part of this conversation, then came out and leaned against the wall in the kitchen listening with a glum look on his face. Finally he exploded, "Kim, what do you think? Don't quote me the Bible and other old opinions, what is your truth?"
Rene arrived at 10 a.m., full of energy, here for a day or two. Also full of questions about U.G.'s chart. We talked a little bit about his Pluto-Mars square and he said he had been violently self-critical, harsh on himself when he was a young man, and that this harshness was reflected in his relations with his family and others. I told him Andrew had called him a cynic with a broken heart and he shrugged it off as he does all aspersions, he is so used to them. Also there is no one there to be hurt or insulted. Or is there?
With some visitors the subject arose again of this natural state and how much energy is released when you give up the hopeless and useless effort to become someone other than who you are, to improve yourself. The frustration at trying to do the impossible, whether striving for enlightenment or social or personal betterment or whatever, uses all your strength.
How handsome and graceful U.G. is, and how spare. He is generous with his time and utterly focused on his guests, uncompromising in his answers, leaving them no ground on which to rest and yet knowing the exact moment when their dialogue must come to an end. Then he says, "Thank you very much for coming," shakes hands and the interview is over. Nothing sloppy or indefinite.
~ ~
U.G. seems very well now. He is adversely affected by hot weather, particularly in India. He said he gets sick easily and often but recovers almost immediately. His organism is extraordinarily sensitive. How he survives on his diet is amazing! He has consumed six pints of heavy cream in less than four days. Everything he eats is white—cereal (oatmeal), pasta, couscous, cream, sugar!
~ ~
U.G. told me his body generates so much electricity he has to wear 100% cotton socks because synthetics generate static. He shops mostly at J.C. Penney or K Mart. He said Parveen Babi, the Indian movie star who used to spend a lot of time with him, bought him clothes, and he still wears the Gucci loafers she insisted he have. Someone else bought him clothes in Italy and he immediately gave away those what he had in his small suitcase.
Yesterday I drove U.G. and Kim up to Mt. Washington to see the leaves. Perhaps it was too long a drive because it was the day of the new moon and U.G. was feeling washed out. When we arrived at the summit, I said there was a wonderful view from the top and he agreed to go. It became apparent that it was a struggle for him, walking over the rocks in his leather-soled loafers, but he was, as always, charming and at ease. We never made it completely to the summit, but paused to see the whole of Connecticut and Massachusetts.
I took some photographs of him, U.G. looking very serious. He mentioned how many thousands of photos have been taken of him over the years, how he is still waiting for the photo, whatever that means. I mentioned later how serious he had looked posing for the photos, and he said, "One thing is sure, the photo will not be smiling. I don't know what a smile is. When I look in the mirror I never smile."
We stopped in Sharon, Connecticut at a shopping center to buy a few things for a snack as U.G. doesn't like going into restaurants. We had a picnic on the hood of the car right in the parking lot, standing up, in front of the supermarket. I suggested finding a more picturesque location for our picnic, and U.G. said emphatically that this was picturesque enough.
~ ~
I felt he was in an odd mood anyway yesterday, certainly having to do with the moon. He was mostly silent, except to blast at Kim regarding his attachment to the Bible. He was quite heated about that stinking God, and the damned Bible that was the cause of all the misery in the world.
Yesterday was odd and U.G. seemed a bit withdrawn. He was gone for hours and returned with his travel reservations made for California, Singapore, Hong Kong and Madras. He is leaving here on the 29th and will then spend three weeks in California. He will have been here, he says, forty days and forty nights, as he had promised on arriving.
In the evening, late, a young man showed up who U.G. said was a cocaine addict, or had been, that he was very hopped up. He came bearing halvah and a chocolate cake from Zabar's, which U.G. turned over to me and I will use for my daughter's birthday this weekend.
~ ~
I mentioned to U.G. just before we turned in, in response to Rene's comments about his big toe being unusual, that Terry had said he had the thirty-two signs of the Buddha. U.G. laughed and said Terry is crazy.
Today he was wearing a white L.L. Bean type fatigue sweater and his chinos from Italy. Aiden bought some flowers (though U.G. says if you want flowers, go outside and look at them in the field, why should they be cut down for your pleasure?) and we left him waiting for some other visitors in good spirits.
All Thursday morning was spent in dialogue with Rene and U.G. about his past life. Hugely interesting, both astrologically and as background to his present condition. For instance, U.G. said that when he was seven he decided that praying to an outside God (he had heretofore made coconut offerings to the monkey god Hanuman) was unnecessary, that the power to affect the outcome of a situation, e.g. whether his grandparents would travel with him to a Theosophical meeting away from home, was dependent on his own will. If he wanted something to happen enough, it would, without Hanuman, and after that the gods and goddesses went out of his system.
U.G. talked about the year of madness that he spent on the streets of London, prior to meeting Valentine. No, he said, it was not some sort of dark night of the soul. It was just a perverse time in his life and he had realized one day he simply would not live that way for another minute. That is when he sought temporary shelter and editing work at the Ramakrishna Center in London.
~ ~
S. met U.G. before he and I went out to lunch yesterday. He told him about his trips to India, all six or seven of them, always covering wars or funerals, Shastri's and Nehru's. U.G. asked him if he thought I would like India. I have been making vague plans to go this winter as U.G. invited me to visit him in Bangalore. I said, "He doesn't know me anymore," and U.G. said, "He knows you well enough to know whether you would like India or not." S. said it all depends on the reason for going and we all agreed there was so much to see how could you not like it.
U.G. is endlessly patient and relaxed with people. He comes and goes but sits and listens if he has nothing to say and seems content just to be present. He answers questions about the origin of life and the universe with counter-questions, "Why do you want to know?" and "What difference does it make?"
I am increasingly attached to U.G. which I know is useless as he is leaving in two weeks but it probably won't be out of sight out of mind. I don't know what it is about him, except that there is just a certain charm and graciousness, the most extraordinary smile. He says he is not smiling, that it is in reaction to you, that you draw everything out of him, he is a kind of mirror.
I do not know what I believe. Sometimes I think I don't have any beliefs of my own. U.G. might say this is true of everyone, that no one has an original thought. For myself I can only say that I feel that behind the nihilism in U.G.'s message is the very immensity that he denies. I can feel this in his presence and cannot even put words to it. Projection or not on my part, I feel this is right. He says he has no devotees, only friends, and that his friends just feel better around him. This is true. Everything seems simpler, clearer. I am not necessarily happy, but I enjoy being busy and helping him by copying tapes and the like.
~ ~
U.G. is an iconoclast, a debunker . He is even debunking the myths that have grown up in his own case, like the dark night of the soul. Terry seems to be responsible for much of this myth-making. I see in myself my tendency to deify U.G., to create a hero. Because to be housing a hero, a great man, would be more exciting, more worthwhile than just an ordinary man, which is what he claims he is. To see this is to let things be simple.
Rene left in the morning and tried to kiss U.G. goodbye. He sidestepped her and dodged away. Part of his background, no doubt. Once again I was struck by his utter ease and gracefulness at handling any situation that comes along.
Sunday night U.G. had sat up quite late with Luna and me, talking about the physical nature of his condition, his Calamity. He said, as he has said before, that it is absolutely and categorically impossible for a person who has gone through the enlightenment process to have sex, that there is simply one and no other and therefore no way, that making love requires two. There is no build-up, no tension. The ending of thought ends the whole thing. Also he talked about there being no one home behind the eyes, that the eyes do not focus on you.
This latter point was particularly noticeable to me as I sat next to U.G. in the car, waiting for Kim to make deliveries. We chatted away about this and that, but as he looked at me, I felt again and again the utter impersonality of his regard. As he looks me in the eyes, it is as if he does not really see me at all, or rather sees through me. Nothing registers, yet he is completely there and not there at the same time, if that makes any sense. I feel both completely at ease and at the same time slightly unnerved, exuberant and tired. Paradox.
At one point driving through Times Square, U.G. looked up at the grey assortment of skyscrapers looming from the window and said, "New York City is breathtaking," and went on to elaborate that when you look at it, you take a deep breath.
~ ~
U.G.'s Calamity centered around the reactivation of the thymus gland, the gland which is active in childhood in everybody but becomes dormant at puberty. When reactivated in this way in his case, it is where real feeling and response to life reside.
I dropped U.G. off at a travel agency on Thirty-Eighth Street and drove uptown via Madison Avenue. In front of Timberland I saw a parking place and feeling it was a sign, an omen, I took it. With Ed's encouragement about shoes for the guru ringing in my ears, I went in and bought a pair of soft moccasins for U.G., guessing at the size—his feet looked to be about the size of my own, though wider and more beautifully formed.
When he arrived home I showed him the shoes, hoping he wouldn't be offended at a gift from me. But not at all, he was very matter of fact, trying them on (a size too small) and not sure about the laces being an annoyance. We postponed a visit from a Jungian analyst for a half hour and took a taxi across the park. U.G. looked at all the various models of moccasins and loafers and finally decided he liked the model I had bought, but in a larger size. I noticed a particular gentleness in the salesman as he treated U.G. with kindness and attention. It was as if he felt there was something unique about this small man with his definite ideas about what he liked and what he didn't.
We left the store and decided to walk home through Central Park, U.G. wearing his new shoes and carrying the Gucci loafers in a Timberland shopping bag. As we reached the zoo, U.G. impulsively dumped the shopping bag containing the Guccis in the trash can, saying, "The right person will find these—I don't need them anymore now that I have new ones."
He elaborated further as we walked home that whenever he gets something new, he gets rid of something old. And since he is always being given new things, he is always giving away perfectly good, practically new clothes. He said he only likes to travel with one pair of shoes, the one on his feet because he doesn't want to carry shoes in his suitcase. He also said he liked the pair I had bought him because they were comfortable and soft ("How I've been torturing myself in those Guccis!") and because they weren't the most expensive, wouldn't last too long, a reminder to me of his stance on impermanence. I was very glad he accepted the shoes and was charmed by the disposal of the Guccis.
Suzanne S. came to see U.G. in the evening. While we were waiting for him, she told me about James Hillman in Paris saying the time had come for therapists to go out into the world and not stay isolated in consulting rooms. A few minutes later, U.G. came into the room saying the same thing, that the time for analysis is over, it is no longer appropriate. He also told Suzanne, in answer to her query about how he found Jung when he met him years ago in Switzerland, that Jung was a crazy mixed up kid! She took it all with equanimity and seemed to enjoy the dialogue.
The night of the San Francisco earthquake U.G. was glued to the television. We watched together for several hours. I was struck by the impassive nature of his watching, detached interest, no comments, no opinions, no emotions. He said if he had been there, he would have just been one with the earthquake. The next day and subsequent days there have been endless calls from all over the world, making sure that he, U.G., wasn't somehow out there and perhaps affected adversely by the earthquake. He had talked to all his friends in Marin County and it appears no one was particularly bothered one way or the other. He will go to California after Chicago to check out the rubble and see his friends.
U.G. mentioned that living with someone is really living their life, not your own and I saw immediately what he meant. So much energy went into concern with A.'s needs and desires, trying to please him, to keep him happy and therefore here (so I wouldn't have to be alone), that I lost touch with my own rhythms and needs. Not that I didn't like being with him, but I see that the small things like waking up and reading in bed, or talking on the phone in privacy, or not eating meals on a schedule were simply denied me during those months together. And I never questioned it. The truth is, as I drove away from the airport after dropping him off, I was suddenly filled with an glorious sense of freedom and lightness, relief, not sad at all.
U.G. asked me point blank the other day what I was doing in this big house with the children grown up and gone away. I kept trying to push the question into the future, but I see that he was showing me that I fill the house in an attempt to fill the abyss of loneliness, rather than facing it. He sees, obviously, that there is constant coming and going here, that I am never alone. He points things out to me in subtle ways and I am able to process the suggestion later on.
For example, when Jerry Gould came from Chicago to see U.G., he ended up inviting both of us, U.G. and me, to his home so he could introduce U.G. to some people in Chicago. We both accepted. The next day, I started to question whether I should go, going into my usual ambivalent mental routine regarding trips. He just put the issue to sleep for me by saying I had made the spontaneous decision to go, why question it, just go. So simple.
~ ~
U.G. likes certain metaphors, particularly now he likens the natural human energy, unencumbered by thought, to Hurricane Hugo, the most recent of autumn storms. Hugo is in fashion with him, as is the simile of hearing your own voice echoing on a trans-Atlantic call being the same as thought reflecting back on itself through relationship to others, something which is in fact, according to U.G., impossible. He says we all live in our own conditioned worlds of ideas and cannot communicate with anyone else about anything.
Last night Werner Engel, an eighty-eight year-old gentleman who lives in my building and was the first Jungian analyst in New York, came to visit U.G. He is a friend of Irena Tweedie's, the Sufi teacher in London and we had exchanged brief interchanges over the years about the Jung Foundation (of which I was a trustee), flying saucers, his health, the weather, and other items. But really I never had any idea he was as erudite or brilliant as he turned out to be. He had no preparation for U.G., nor U.G. for him.
The two polar opposite positions—Werner representing the possibility of growth, transformation, self-knowledge, appreciation of pleasure and joy, and U.G. denying all that, including not only the unconscious but consciousness itself, the Self, and the psyche—were presented with the precision and beauty of a perfect ballet (or tennis match, as Werner called it). They treated each other with the utmost respect and deference, and truly it seemed as if there was a kind of glow. U.G. would debunk everything I have said. But he did say that Werner was a most extraordinary man for his age, such a perfect memory, so interesting. And the humility of both of them, saying what an honor it had been and how much they had each learned from the other. Incredible.
I saw a new dimension to U.G., as I do nearly every day now. I felt sure that he could have destroyed Werner's position, but U.G. ended the dialogue at a point where Werner still had ground on which to stand, that is his belief structure, that he, Werner, preferred his place to U.G.'s defended fortress. But U.G. said there is no fortress, as there is nothing to defend or define. At the elevator door as he was leaving, Werner admitted to me that U.G. was right, but that he, Werner, had to believe in the possibility of transformation or his whole life's work would have been of no value. I was touched by the encounter.
When I said last night after Werner left that it would be wonderful to recreate the interview on videotape, U.G. said shortly, "Why recreate anything?" And I felt chastened and a bit silly. I'm always trying to hold onto things, to not let go. U.G. says it is hopeless, that we are incapable of throwing away old clothes let alone our opinions and thoughts and ideas.
~ ~
U.G. has seemed to be ambivalent about leaving New York, but he tells me it is not as it appears, that he's not undecided, but merely that the computer hasn't made a final printout on his plans yet. He says there is often a rogue factor that pushes the final decision into focus.
Last days in New York before Chicago. U.G. reminds me of an advertisement for The Accidental Tourist. This morning he brought out his new suitcase to show me what he says he could travel around the world with. Very small, with neat compartments. He bought it yesterday (very expensive, $159 reduced to $79) with Harry's combined birthday and Christmas (in advance) checks. He and Kim sent off cartons to Switzerland and California with books, tapes and extra clothes. I suggested U.G. leave some of his clothes here so he would have them next time he came to New York, and said this also might insure his return. "I wouldn't come back for clothes," he rejoined. But admitted that he hadn't got New York out of his system as yet, maybe he will return in the spring.
Attention to detail: He carries just three pair of pants, three shirts and a pair of white Calvin Klein long underwear which he uses as pajamas but says he will have copied in India. One pair of shoes, the Timberlands which now are without laces. U.G. says he will have some leather put on in California to cover the brass holes where the laces were. He says he never puts shoes in his suitcase, so one pair is all he ever allows himself. Oh, to be able to live in such a light manner, to be so unattached. So unencumbered.
A group of people came last night to see U.G., among them B who seemed pretty whacked out to me. This morning U.G. told me, "Your friend is finished. She needs medication, not therapy." He referred to Suzanne's comments about the side effects of drug therapy and added that it's better to have the side effects than suicide. He seems to see right into people.
~ ~
U.G. answers questions about the origin of life and the universe with counter-questions, "Why do you want to know?" and "What difference does it make?"
~ ~
My mother came to meet U.G. for a night and a day. She beat a hasty retreat, I think, saying she felt uneasy around him, charming and unique though he is. Clearly, her strategies for communicating don't work with him because he doesn't operate on a personal level. "Are you an animal lover?" she asked U.G. in an attempt to engage him in conversation. "I myself am an animal," he answered her. "I don’t even love human pets!"
He said to me after she left, "Your mother is a very tough cookie!" This is the truth. He also said it was very good that she is as independent of me as she is, my being an only child and all. I was glad to hear this because I sometimes think her fierce independence is her undoing, her inability to relate except on the most superficial level.
The cats are going wild with the impending departures. U.G emphasized again this morning how psychic they are and how much they know, not in any spiritual sense.
Chicago was momentous. I loved traveling on the plane with U.G. Part of the time, it was as if we didn't even know each other, very detached. And yet I felt safe and excited to be with him.
Jerry and Katharine met us at the airport and took us to their apartment overlooking the lake and Lincoln Park. The three days went by very quickly. One day U.G.'s granddaughter, Kusuma, who lives in Waukegan came with her husband and the three of us drove around Chicago and later she made poori bread and showed us how to do it.
~ ~
U.G. and I were walking past a camera store when I saw a sign saying video cameras for rent. Suddenly the idea to rent one popped into my head and I acted on it, with U.G. looking on. I realized I have been missing something incredible. Why didn't I get one in New York while he was there? The range is fantastic after stills and it opens a whole new world.
Two episodes with U.G. particularly stand out. On the way in from the airport we were talking about driving across the country and I said, "I would love to drive you!" and he took my hand and said, "Thank you!" Then he qualified the moment, explaining that had been an emotion in a frame, and then it was over.
The same thing happened as we were walking around Chicago. We went all the way to his old apartment building on South Michigan Avenue one day where he had lived married when his children were young. He was full of memories and anecdotes, about Mr. Dixon the old man who came to see him every day and gave him some of his retirement income to live on, and the woman with whom he had the infamous one night stand, and his marriage, and emotional non-existent emotional life. We walked and walked and at one point he said he was having a good time in Chicago and I was helping make it that way. It was almost personal, but just as he said, the moment passed and the emotion was erased, forgotten.
U.G. said he wished I could travel around the world with him with a video camera and that immediately planted the thought in my head that this is just what I would like to do.
~ ~
U.G. let me cook for him, something he has not let happen before. A few of Jerry’s friends came to see him, and a couple of mine. I realized I had no time to see anyone else, I was completely focused on him, much more so than I was in New York. I also kept dropping things, breaking Jerry’s favorite cup and a plate, very strange.
Something has shifted. I got sick the last day, coming down with the flu, sore throat and fever. On the flight back to New York, U.G. read my palm and told me I don't know my own heart and that I am level headed and creative. When we reached New York, I thought it would be easier for him to go back into the city and wait for his San Francisco flight there, rather than at Kennedy. I drove him back to the airport three hours later.
~ ~
He said goodbye, shook hands and was off. I asked U.G. whether I would need to get shots for India. "Oh no," he said. "We’re not worried about your germs there!"
~ ~
I had already decided to go see him in California. The next morning at 6, U.G. called from Mill Valley, to say he had arrived, was fine, and to find out how I was. He said he had talked to Moorty and had told him that as far as he is capable of being sentimental, he was, which of course is not at all. I felt very touched. That week I called him or he called me nearly every day. I decided to go once I got over the flu and bought my ticket.
