Nicola Barker - The Cauliflower

It strikes me as curious that Sita’s name means “furrow”—in the way a brow may be furrowed into a frown — and yet what she gifted to Uncle was the very opposite of a scowl.

In truth, I cannot recollect ever finding Uncle’s smile anything but charming (even as ape-Uncle, there was a certain magnetism to it), but after Uncle’s vision of Sita the smile on his lips was a thing of such beauty that people would gasp when they saw it. And Uncle smiled constantly. When he prayed or he sang or he chanted or he slept (which was rarely) or he danced or he talked, Uncle would always be smiling. He would radiate joy and peace and great serenity. That’s not to say Uncle was always happy. Not at all. Uncle still struggled in his spiritual journey. He was often upset and confused. But his smile would light up his eyes and play around his lips even then — even during our darkest hours.

One could light a room with Uncle’s smile. One could melt ice with it. Uncle’s smile could warm any soul and bring comfort to it. To be the recipient of one of Uncle’s tender smiles is to feel like the richest man on earth. It is at once feminine and warm and comforting and holy. It is a most gracious and a most loving smile.

Oh, how I hunger and thirst for that smile of Uncle’s! But presently I am most cruelly deprived of it, because Uncle has returned to Kamarpukur to stay for some months with his beloved mother.

Chandradevi, after many years of very little contact with her youngest son, had lately been receiving mixed reports about Uncle’s progress at the temple, and had become, as a consequence, sick with worry about him. Uncle’s mother is most adored by Uncle — as any good mother surely must be by all but the most ungrateful and disloyal of her offspring. Uncle’s mother was Uncle’s first great love, after all. And her example has stood as the foundation stone of what has become his most natural and most powerful spiritual mood of childlike love and devotion to the Goddess Kali.

Uncle’s great loves are his two mothers. Uncle venerates them both, and seems perfectly oblivious to Chandradevi’s faults — her simplicity and her naivety. Perhaps this is because Uncle has chosen to adopt some of those qualities for himself (Uncle can be very simple and naive on occasion), although in Uncle these faults find a strange kind of perfection.

Because Uncle cannot be expected to do anything on his own, I journeyed home with Uncle and helped him to find his bearings for a while. But then I returned with a heavy heart to my duties at Dakshineswar. I cannot pretend that I did not think it was good for Uncle to get away from the stressful atmosphere of the Kali Temple. Uncle had been in a state of heightened spiritual emotion for far too long. He was very thin and exhausted and confused. Uncle was a small boat being tossed around in a great spiritual storm. It was most necessary for him to pull into a safe port for a while. And where better or safer a port than Kamarpukur?

Uncle has now been gone for almost a year, and I miss him every moment. Life is flat without Uncle. There is no color in the divine worship. Sometimes, I must shamefully confess, I have felt as if Uncle has stood in the way of my progress in life — how may I hope to find my own path if I am always helping Uncle to find his (especially when that path is fraught with chaos and danger — a briary thicket which I must be constantly hacking through with a blunted knife)?

But now that Uncle is gone I pine for him terribly. In the way that Uncle pines for Ma Kali, I pine for Uncle. There is something so special about Uncle, and a little part of whatever is so special about Uncle rubs itself off on me, too, just because I am always close to him. When Uncle is here, I become the precious setting in which the jewel of Uncle may be shown off to its very best advantage. I hold Uncle firmly so that the light may hit his many sharp, fine-cut surfaces and sparkle. When Uncle is not here, all I seem to do is talk about Uncle. People do not forget him, and I will not let them forget him, either. How can I? So much of my conversation starts and finishes with “Uncle says … Uncle thinks … Uncle … Uncle … Uncle…”

Uncle is my compass now. I cannot negotiate the world without him. He is my still center. Without Uncle everything just spins pointlessly around.

I know I should feel happy and calm without the chaos of Uncle complicating my life, but instead I am like a drowning man being dragged into an endless whirlpool. Where is my anchor? Where is my help? Where is my hope, if not in Uncle?

I have returned to the village to visit Uncle on two occasions and am very comforted to see that he is much more at his ease now. Uncle lives a quiet life in Kamarpukur. His spiritual moods appear less extreme. Although Chandradevi informs me that she does not see as much of Uncle as she would like — he spends most of his time alone at the cremation ground, lost deep in contemplation.

Even so, Chandradevi is most happy and grateful to have Uncle back home with her once more. But still she fusses and worries over Uncle, as a mother will. She even set upon a scheme to get Uncle a wife! When I first heard of this plan I must admit that I was rather disconcerted. A marriage? A wife? Are there not already a sufficiency of problems for us to worry over with Uncle? And Uncle has made it very plain that he has no interest in living a householder’s life. Uncle cares only for spiritual matters. Uncle cares not a jot for women or for gold. Was not the worm of lust expelled from his penis?

I spoke to Uncle about Chandradevi’s plans, but Uncle just smiled and shrugged. He would not oppose his beloved mother. So a search was begun to find Uncle a wife. But there was nobody suitable in the nearby villages — no girl who could reach Chandradevi’s high standards for Uncle. And of course Uncle’s reputation generally preceded him. People love Uncle dearly, but he is hardly to be considered good husband material!

The search for a suitable match went on for many weeks, until Chandradevi was quite despairing, and then one morning Uncle announced that he had found his future bride all by himself. We were very confused because Uncle had done nothing but sit in the cremation ground and pray and meditate and appear completely indifferent to the ongoing search. Even so, Uncle provided his mother with the name of a girl in the village of Jayrambati. This name was Saradamani. We had no reason to think that Uncle had ever met or even heard of this girl before. But when we went to the address a girl was there, just five years old, and her father was very happy with the prospect of a betrothal. And so Uncle was married, and then the young girl — a sweet and obliging child — was sent back to live in the bosom of her family until she came of age. Uncle, for his part, after all these excitements, was now ready to turn his mind, once again, to Dakshineswar and the Kali Temple. What a relief it was to prepare for Uncle’s return! And yet why did my heart sink a little at the mere thought of it?

I swear I do not know whether I am coming or going with Uncle. But I have certainly missed his lovely smile and his constant scolding. Uncle is funny. While he is completely detached from all worldly concerns, he can still be very particular and fussy and sarcastic about the finer details of things. He is certainly a most demanding master. My heart always sings and jumps like a cricket when he is around.

1868, approximately

Sri Ramakrishna offers three humble starting-points for meditation:

“Imagine the sky—

Vast — gray — covered in dense cloud:

Stand and gaze, in awe.”

“Imagine a lake—

This huge expanse of water,

But utterly still.”

“Imagine a lamp

With an unflickering flame—