If you asked me when I first realized that there was something bigger outside than my own little world, I would be tempted to recall a seven year old camping on a rocky island in Ontario gazing at the stars. But truth be told it would be the day I struck up a friendship with Peter. Peter is his real name, because I cannot dishonor my first real guru by using a pseudonym. Other elements I will disguise to preserve his anonymity. We were both freshmen in high school, in a large midwestern city.
As near as I can recall, he introduced himself by handing me a book, and saying “Here, you need to read this.” It was Ken Kesey’s One Flew Over the Cuckoo’s Nest. The year was 1963, and at fourteen years of age, it was safe to say I had never read a book like that. Thus began a series of clandestine book handoffs that awakened and expanded my brain into uncharted territory. Peter gave me Jerzy Kosinski’s The Painted Bird, I Jan Cremer, The Dharma Bums and Naked Lunch. Even Edward Gorey. He set me on a lifelong course of reading works on the edge.
A little over a year ago we reconnected on Facebook, and shared reminiscences of Gary Snyder’s Smoky The Bear Sutra, of which apparently he has a signed and framed copy on his wall in the California town where he lives. He is apparently in poor health with multiple issues, of which I have been reluctant to ask him about. He indicates he is living alone on disability.
Step aside a moment and allow me to trace my all too familiar spiritual path as a child of the sixties. I was a religion and philosophy major in college. I have practiced some form of meditation more or less continuously for over forty years. This year, with the reading of some Sri Ramana Maharshi, and several other Western non-dualists, I feel like I have come to the end of my searching.
Last week I posted a brief witticism on Facebook which I called the Vedanta Diet: Who is this “I” who thinks “he” is hungry? My Facebook friends list is in the low hundreds, but does included a number of progressive and new agers types, none of whom either saw the humor or felt it worthy of response. No matter. It was primarily a joke at my expense, as I have been struggling this year to keep my weight down.
But then Peter responded: “Tat tvam Chips Ahoy!” Of course my guru would see through it. I responded, “Be well, Bhagavan...” I know I must visit him now to complete my journey.