Thirteen
In Denver they were very happy with that. Especially the reports of
balanced books and a surplus of money, were greeted there with great
enthusiasm. So I bought a suitcase that would keep my Van Gils suits from
crumpling and took a plane to Denver to there go to the office everyday, just like
the rest of the world. There I put mailings out to the national headquarters,
telling them how to set up their organization. Because I didn’t have a clue
about the situation there, or about what Maharaj ji actually wanted, it all
stayed pretty unreal. Just like the phone calls for advice. Like Roberto,
general secretary of Spain, staying up that night to be able to call me about
finding his housemother and ashramcoordinator the morning before in the
meditation room. On the floor, together, ‘you know’. Both of them he couldn’t
do without. “What should I do?” I had no idea and also had to join a meeting
about international program development, still trying to find out what it
meant, and about funding the Grumman Gulfstream. It was just like a real office.
Exactly there, right in the centre of the Divine Light Mission, other
matters too were, to a growing extent, just like the rest of the world. Nobody
except his security people, his personal aids and ‘president’ Bob Denton ever
got to see Maharaj ji himself. But his lifestyle did affect the people that had
to arrange it all for him. The job of my ashram mate Joe Schwartz for instance,
was to rent films for Maharaj ji whenever he exchanged his ‘divine residence’
in Malibu California for Denver to discuss business with Bob. As soon as he
left for Malibu again, Joe dragged projector, screen and rented films into our
ashram, where we in all secrecy and taunted by the strangling question of
whether we had now definitely fallen of the path watched Little Big Man and the
Godfather. Two favorites of Maharaj ji, Joe assured.
And while watching a rented movie apparently was all right, then why not
in a theater, Tom White, another house-mate of the ashram in Franklin Street
wondered. He worked at the ‘petty cash’ on Finance and because of this could
always get his hands on some money. So together we went to Denver’s fifty cent
theater, a refuge for winos, love couples without a roof of their own and
lovers of Woody Allen’s early funny ones that played there non-stop from eight
in the morning till midnight. For fifty cents you could stay there till you
knew every joke by heart.
And because Maharaj ji had a motor home as huge as a public bus in order
to see America, with a kitchen, bathroom, sleeping room and all, Tom figured we
could take the Ford Capri of Finance to Aspen, a ski resort about three hundred
miles up in the Rocky Mountains that until then I had only seen in the far
distance walking to the office. He taught me how to stay upright on ski’s, we
visited the local hippie theatre (‘bring out your favorite smoke wear’) and
crashed at a former girl friend’s from before he joined Maharaj ji. More
mistakes together were hardly possible.
And because Maharaj ji when he was sixteen married a follower called
Marolyn, who worked in his ‘divine residence’ in Malibu, and even had a child
with her, I already figured in Amsterdam that I could once and a while hold
hands with Stefanie, with whom I could always talk about all things so well. In
Denver I missed her. The American followers were definitely warm-hearted and
kind, but in Denver I kept walking around as a bit-player lost on the wrong
film set. And without any idea where to find the exit.
When I was in Denver for about a year, Maharaj ji made a European tour.
Beforehand I went to all the countries he wanted to visit, to check whether the
local premies had their organization sufficiently together to receive him. In
practice that meant they had to have enough money and management to organize
and attract people to a gathering for a few thousand people, and to accommodate
Maharaj ji and his staff for almost a week in the best hotel available. So I
checked if the hall they rented was big enough, the hotel rooms luxurious
enough and if there was enough money to ‘check out the city’ with Maharaj ji.
He didn’t have contact with the premies that welcomed him to their country, but
if he went to see the city, which he liked to do, they had to come along. To
pay. The watches in Switzerland, I still remember well. One shop after another.
Together with the national general secretary I followed the small group that
hung around Maharaj ji like a cloud on his tour of the shiny showcases. We
didn’t see much of him at all. We heard his voice though when he asked a shop
assistant to get a watch from behind the bullet-proof glass. When he liked what
he saw, Bob Denton signaled in our direction. Pay. While we were still
finishing up doing that, the cloud had already drifted into the next jewelry
shop.
In the meantime Bob Denton married his secretary, so I also had to
arrange a double room with a cozy big bed in the hotels for him. I myself
wasn’t part of the direct staff, so when the group arrived, I had already
rolled out my sleeping bag in the local ashram and asked the housemother for
some hangers so I could get my suits out of the suitcase for a few days. And if
I could call Amsterdam, where I had ever longer conversations with Stefanie,
eventually leading to the conclusion that I wanted to get married too. The two
of us in a little house, just like that.
After Goblin Valley Janny and I drive further south through Utah,
heading for Bryce Canyon and the deserts of Arizona. The towns are more
colorful and friendly now that we have left Interstate 70 and are following
smaller roads southbound. The gas station and general store are along a road
with just two lanes, the parking lots have shrunk, the fronts have wooden
porches and not only do the shops sell lawn mowers and gas, they also carry
fishing gear, cowboy hats, buckle belts and Indian jewelry. Nature is
‘stunning’ without end and has dimensions that you can travel through only very
slowly, even in a Chevrolet Impala. Red and pink sculptures are standing as
wise watchmen along the way.
After quite some nagging at Bob Denton, who in his turn discussed the
matter with Maharaj ji, Stefanie and I were allowed to get married. So when the
whole company flew back from Europe to Denver, we drove in the Divine Light
Mission car to the town hall and the next day to the Rutgers foundation for the
pill, although we’d never even exchanged a kiss. We had no idea how to handle
this within the ashram.