LA Retreat

(News from Los Angeles, June 27)

An elderly and frail woman came for darshan in the special needs line today. Her eyes were closed, and the darshan line helper could not get her attention. But noticing her right away, Amma called out, "Daughter, daughter,", and when the woman opened her eyes, asked a helper to bring a wheelchair. Gently refusing the wheelchair, the lady softly chanted "I love you, Amma," while awaiting her turn.

She had told a helper earlier that she was suffering from terminal cancer, and that she hoped to die in Amma's arms.

"Where is your family?" Amma had asked the woman in Seattle three weeks earlier. Well, she had brought them here to see Amma in LA - sons, daughters-in-law, grandchildren - nineteen of them! They all registered for the LA retreat, and came for darshan.

"It is wonderful to see such family unity these days," beamed Amma. "It reminds me of olden days when large joint families used to live together in harmony." The onlookers smiled and applauded.

Gazing wonderingly at Amma and murmuring, "Oh, Amma, you are so beautiful - I love you," the woman came up for darshan. She then added something like, "I want to breathe my last near you!"

"Last?!" Amma exclaimed in a concerned voice before pulling her in for a tight hug.

When asked about her darshan later, the woman related that when she went up, Amma's eyes were streaming. "Amma first wiped her own tears with her hands," the woman said in a voice that was deeply moved. "And then " she mimicked Amma stroking the woman's cheeks in turn with her moist hands, as if wiping away the woman's tears as well. "Amma kept touching her own heart and then mine," she continued.

"She meditates like a yogi," Amma explained afterwards. "She is always smiling, and considers death as just a change of clothing."