Falling a prey..

It was dusk turning to night. In the streets of Srirangam some boys were heatingly talking on sundry topics. Suddenly some feud cropped up between the two of them. One was myself and the other was one boy, a little older than myself. The topic was 'Can one see God?'

My opponent was vehement that one cannot. I was categorical that such a thing was really possible. Have I not read in an old text book of 1941, my father's high school reader, in an essay on Sri Ramakrishna, the golden saying of Sri R that if a person sincerely weeps for God for three days, surely he will see God? What more certainty one needs? And what this boy is saying it cannot be? I became an intense advocate for Sri Ramakrishna's words and the issue went to an old lady, grandma of one of our friends. She heard him out first. And again I was stating my case and presenting references from that old high school reader and the assurance of the Sage of Dakshineswar. What she thought escapes me even now. But she pronounced me as the victor and hastily went into her quarters. From that moment, knowingly unknown to me, I was slowly being won over by 'Ramkishto'.

In the following years I was buying little books of him, Vivekananda and others. And in my ninth standard, I had already started one 'Sri Ramakrishna Vivekananda Sangam' gathering my little associates and juniors, conducting regular evening congregations of us, small boys only, much to the dismay of un-understanding elders and street-folks. Of course the venture was short lived. But my 'sangam' with Sri Ramakrishna, Vivekananda, Holy Mother and Sister Nivedita was growing day by day in the company of a new friend Dilip.

It has been a continuing education all through down this time and I am opening this blog to my inexpert engagement with their spiritual message. And why not?