journal d'une transition

246

Early this morning I felt like drafting a few lines in answer to that grotesque letter of dismissal sent by the SAS to Piero, as I have found the reply prepared by the Coop too complicated and too focussed on Piero. … It is Sunday; I am pruning young trees in the garden here when Mangini comes to call me and P.G: Piero is meeting with the sub-Collector at Matrimandir and needs us. Several others are already there when we reach. There are a few Inspectors too. We are told that the man who had been arrested in Pondy has already escaped (or bribed his way out, most likely). Then the Collector himself arrives, a fat middle-aged babu, unctuous and well-spoken and clearly unsympathetic! The message that is then conveyed to us is that we are to slow down on our work of dismantling the towers, so as to give them time to find “a harmonious solution”… Under the niceties, there is a distinct threat; Valya, the sub- Collector, is obviously ill at ease… We ask politely whether a similar message is handed to the SAS…! *1-10-1979, Auroville: At work today, I don’t know how, I fell between two planks; I caught myself in time and there are only a few scratches on my leg and cheek, but the nervous shock remains… I feel contrary pressures almost constantly… And I realise that I am clinging, clinging to Matrimandir, clinging to things: a smallness of being, a lack of self-giving and of joy, a lack of trust in life itself, a lack of simplicity… That I must learn to let go, to open, to give… *2-10-1979, Auroville: C.E has been brooding and resentful and darkly separate. I have given up on any attempt to reach him; yet I also think I may be unjust – I can’t blame him for projecting his own difficulties on me; I do the same, I suppose…! The problem is that he requires seeing me as the antagonist, the barrier; that implies that he cannot trust me and, therefore, we cannot take it all in our stride, as our common work. The only way that seems to remain open is for me to understand, to accept the conditions without rejecting him: this has to be my contribution, rather than seeking a living reciprocity… … Some good things are happening, though: yesterday we received a donation of Rs 56,OOO/- for Matrimandir! … This evening, E.B comes to sit with me here for a while; she reveals to me a dream-experience she had years ago: she had seen herself as a young man, fighting me in a duel, some time in the 15 th century in England, near the cathedral of Canterbury; and I killed her (him) and she saw herself abruptly leaving her (his) body and rising fast above the cathedral… I found this interesting; it corroborates an experience I also had, fleeting but vivid, of this very scene – of the duel -, while meeting once in her eyes an kind of rivalry, an antagonism, that had nothing to do with our present lives and the pattern of our relationship; but I had not seen that I had killed her (him)! … Th has returned from Germany and it seems that he has chosen his “side”; I am apprehensive and sad about it; I have always liked him; this hurts! … Satprem has sent us all a one-page quote of a text of Sri Aurobindo on the need to unite equality with the will to fight those who oppose the Work; it refers to Sri Krishna’s injunction to Arjuna… Yes, it is true, it is true…! But, Mother; has it ever worked? It was not able to transform.