Believer

Having lived in the fast-paced world of the West, I was struck by the serenity that a simple ritual can bring to the start of any day. Offering prayers along with fresh fruits or sweets to the family deity gives us a moment to be retrospective, grateful, and centered. The first time I witnessed Maa, my mother-in-law, do this was when she visited us a year after our wedding. Maa is tall and slim with cascading, salt, and pepper hair. She wears her hair in a neat bun while she cooks or has a meal but most of the time, she leaves it down. Maa’s softly contoured face draws attention to her eyes. They are big, deep brown, slightly curved up at the sides under perfectly shaped eyebrows. There is a warm glow in them that reflects a sense of peace that seems inherent in her. She drapes herself in pastel-colored saris that she appears very comfortable in. Her hands are rough, with yellowing, ridged nails and stubby wrinkled fingers - clearly hands of a hard-working woman. Her life spent in cleaning and cooking for her family seemed to have affected her hands the most, the rest of her has aged with much grace.

She carried a photograph of the family deity with her, which she placed on the nightstand in the guest room she occupied during her visit. She asked me for a set of unused plates and glasses. She loved the idea of offering her deity food in a shining crystal bowl and water in a small shot glass. I don’t think she knew what a shot glass really is, though.

That first morning, as I watched, she unpacked a small can of Indian sugar drops called ‘nakul dana.’ These are white, double the size of a single peppercorn, with little pointed protrusions – they photograph like popcorn but are made of sugar. That is the best description I can offer. In her broken English, she explained, that she had come prepared so God would have something for the first few days of her visit.

“When the jet lag is gone,” she said, “I will buy special American fruits and sweets for Him.” Her English was rudimentary, but she insisted on speaking it with me. It was endearing to hear her speak in English to her son in my presence, switching back to her native tongue as soon as she thought I was out of hearing range.

She unpacked incense, a garland of plastic flowers, sandalwood powder, a small silver bell and a clay conch. “They told me I could not carry my original conch shell across country borders, so I got this one. It is not as loud as my real one at home. But it will do,” she said, as she blew on it once. I had heard the conch at the Hindu Temple, near our town, during our visit there. This one was softer. The silver bell had a sweet jingle, and the incense was milder than I anticipated. It had a woody essence that seemed to spread a sweet mysterious aroma around the house.

Each morning Maa washed the bowl and glass, sat on a small rug in front of the nightstand and lit incense. She meditated for a while before making her offerings to the deity. She rang the bell with her left hand waving the incense in front of the photograph with her right. Then she blew on the conch three times. Going on her knees and bending down she touched her head to her folded hands placed on the ground, next she arose from the rug, rolled it up and put it under the bed. Then she left the room, shutting the door behind her, ready for the rest of the day. Later, after her first cup of tea, she brought the ‘nakul dana’ down to the kitchen and put them in a small bowl. She had a few with breakfast, gave me a few and kept some for her son to have on his return from work.

“Why don’t you bring it down when you are done your prayers?” I asked her.

“Just to make sure that God has had the time to bless the offerings,” she said. I glanced at her and realized she was serious about that response. I refrained from questioning that logic.

I noticed that the nightstand on which she placed the photograph of the deity was too high, as she sat on a rug in front of it. As a wedding gift we had received a mini trinket shelf unit that had never been assembled. It was mahogany trimmed with glass doors, sides, and shelves. It was the right height and would make a perfect altar. My husband and I decided to put it up and surprise her. So, that first weekend, I left my husband to assemble the makeshift altar and took Maa to the groceries with me. I asked her to pick up whatever she wished to offer her deity. It was great to watch her childlike exuberance as she picked some almonds, cashews, raisins, and chocolates. I could tell she was excited as she spoke to me in her native tongue unaffected by the fact that I did not understand a word. I nodded and smiled and encouraged her along - her beaming demeanor clearly reflected her joy.

When we got home Maa was overjoyed on seeing the ‘altar’ and had tears in her eyes as she hugged us. She brought the picture over from her nightstand and requested me to ring the bell while her son blew on the conch. She placed the framed photograph on the shelf, with a lot of ceremony. Maa repeatedly thanked me, which surprised me, it was her son who had put the altar up after all. Later, my husband said that, through her tears, Maa said she knew I was responsible for this beautiful arrangement. A small gesture made because I felt the height of the nightstand was too high, had an impact that was never my intent. I realized that day, how important empathy is for any relationship to blossom into a soul bond.

Maa wanted to communicate better in English and me to learn the native language, food habits and heritage of the family I had married into. The time I spent with Maa gave me a bird’s eye view of some customs, traditions, and values about a culture, that piqued my interest. We spent much of the day together gardening, cooking, looking through photo albums, listening to music and generally getting to know each other - our differences and our similarities - as a culture and as individuals. The more I got to know her the more I liked this lady from a world very different from my own. I was quite impressed with how good her language skills were and how easily she adapted to our way of living. I had spent most of my life adjusting to others and having someone adjust to my ways was not simply refreshing but very uplifting.

Having been raised in foster homes I had learned to be a ‘good girl,’ always doing what was expected of me; eating what I was given, when I was given it; saying what others wanted to hear. It was my way of surviving and ensuring that I was not disliked. I had learned very early on, watching fellow foster brothers and sisters, that to ask for or to refuse something was not acceptable behavior and eventually meant punishment or even banishment. I realize now that it took away my capacity to ask for anything, including love. Each morning Maa would hug me, but she had this curious way of going about it. She would come up to me and hold her arms out with a slight nod of her head as if asking me if I wanted a hug. The first couple of times I was not sure how to respond and she simply laughed and said, “I know you want one, so come on.” We would hug and she would raise her hands, hold my face and gently pull it down while raising hers to drop a soft kiss on my forehead before releasing me. She would ask for my permission before she did anything around the house and it was very awkward for me. Here was my mother-in-law who, instead of ordering me around, was asking for permission. It was easy to fall in love with this very gentle lady.

My life, thus far, had been a search for my mother. More because I wanted to know why I had been abandoned and less to get to know her. When Maa asked me if I remembered my mother I simply answered, “No, I do not. I know she was not anything like you. She would not have abandoned me if she was.”

“Oh, no, my child,” said Maa, “Don’t pass judgment on someone you know nothing about. I have made many mistakes in my lifetime that I am sure my family would not be very proud of either. It is only through life experiences that we learn right from wrong.”

Sometimes I wondered if Maa was too good to be true. I had never imagined meeting a person who was perfect, but Maa was as close to perfection that I can imagine a person being. Yes, she snored - loud - and she did not like house pets but there was nothing else I could say that was negative about her. Maybe her inability to say, “I love you,” in so many words could be counted as one of her weaknesses, but she expressed those words beautifully simply by being herself.

Maa would freshen up and wait for her son in the living room every evening. Her eyes on the driveway, she would look out for his car. As soon as his eyes met hers, she would give him a welcoming smile. He would smile back and nod his acknowledgment of her presence. Then Maa would simply leave us alone. She would go to the kitchen, fill up a fresh glass of water, leave it on the counter with the ‘nakul danas’ from the morning prayers, then go up to her room and wait for one of us to call for her. She showed her love by giving us the time and space in our home. She never interfered if my husband and I had an argument, never commented on it afterwards either. She was quick to appreciate anything we did. Small things, like my husband bringing in fresh flowers, would bring a smile to her face and a comment like “Flowers make a house smell and look beautiful. How nice of you to bring them for your wife.” If I baked a cake, she would comment about how beautiful the whole house smelt or how envious she was that I could bake, and she never did or how happy she was that her son had found such a wonderful wife. She had a way of making loved ones feel loved without once saying the words, “I love you.” Her body language, her behavior, her simple ways said it loud and clear.

She had a way of expressing her disapproval too. A frown - a very deep one - a puckered up nose and a shaking of the head. We were at a restaurant for dinner one evening and ordered a grilled salmon for her. She looked at her plate with her classic look of disapproval and when I asked her what was wrong, she said nothing.

“Would you like something different?” I asked.

“Can I have another bowl of the soup with some bread?” she asked.

Grilled food was not to her liking at all. When we walked out of the restaurant she said, “Now I know why you all are so fair. You don’t eat turmeric and red chilies.”

Another of her disapprovals was expressed at the beach. Scantily dressed women embarrassed Maa. “We have beaches in our country too. You can go in the water with your clothes on. It is just as much fun.”

“The sea does not mind if you don’t wear all your clothes Maa,” said her son.

She gave him her disapproving look and said, “It is not the sea that minds, it is dignified people that mind. The body is a personal belonging and should not be shared with everyone. You keep it covered so only those dearest and nearest to you know it. That is the way we show respect to ourselves. Temptation is the first step to committing a sin. Why be the cause of other people’s sin?”

“Maa if someone is tempted it is not because they see something, it is because they do not have a clean mind,” argued her son.

“So why put oil into an already burning fire? More the reason not to tempt those who are evil. Just like you lock your home to keep it safe from thieves.” Maa was very clear in her mind about her reasons.

Towards the end of her visit my husband left on one of his rare business trips. After we dropped him off at the airport, I took Maa to the Hindu Temple. She was visibly impressed with the opulence and the clean environment of the altar and hallways and on the way home she asked me, in her much-improved English, why I did not go to Church every Sunday.

I said, “I don’t believe in God.”

She was quiet for a few minutes, then asked, “What does that mean? You don’t believe in God?”

“I don’t believe there is a God who is responsible for everything that is happening,” I replied.

I was hoping the conversation would not proceed along these lines as we had quite a way to travel in the closed environment of the car. I did not wish to have a conflict, at the tail end of her trip, about a subject that we evidently thought differently about. I was thinking about ways to change the subject when she surprised me by saying, “who said that God is responsible for everything? I do not believe that either.”

That stumped me. Here was a lady, who offered food to a photograph each morning; left the photograph alone to bless the food; and sang hymns out loud in praise of God, claiming she did not think God was omnipotent.

“Really? But you pray every day. Why?” I asked.

“It’s like this - when I was a child, I had a special doll that I treated like my baby. I fed her, bathed her, sang lullabies to her, and loved having her with me all the time. When you visit us I will show you my Polly. She is in a glass case in our living room back home now. Occasionally I take her out and change her clothes, dust her, and even hug her when no one is looking. I know she is not a real baby - I have had 5 babies of my own. Does that mean I should not honor the good things I learned as I played mother to Polly? In the same way, at first, I thought God lives in temples and in the idol or photograph in the altar. Now I honor photographs, idols, and temples because that is where the seeds of my spiritual development were sowed and watered. My belief in a God in heaven wanting me to grow up to be a good, kind person kept me honest, kind and loving. Today I bow down to that Power within that keeps giving me the wisdom to be good.”

I was surprised at the depth this simple lady from a faraway land possessed.

“So, who is God to you today?” I asked.

“I believe that there is one Supreme Soul that is expressed through each of us. I have not seen God, but I see his reflection in everything. We are all here to fulfill a purpose and to enjoy our time here as a gift, handed to us in the form of life. Feelings, creatures, and things small and big are all expressions of a Power. I call that God. Others may give it another name and that is fine too. It is God who gives us the opportunity to freely choose who we want to become and what we want to believe.

“I have evidence,” she continued, “that God brought you into my son’s life to bring happiness and joy to him. You have given him love and made him feel as if he belongs here in this country. You have made me feel at home here too. You are our angel - our gift of God. Can you disprove that? If not, I must declare that God exists.

“That last sentence I learned from your father-in-law. He was a lawyer you see, and he wanted proof about everything,” she said, with a chuckle.

I stopped the car on the side of the highway as my eyes had misted over. I removed my seat belt, turned, and hugged Maa. I had just witnessed the presence of God in my life. I had anticipated having to defend my disbelief in a God, instead I learned that all things are an expression of Love. To be loved by someone unconditionally, independent of who I am or what I do, was a blessing that had never been mine. This lady taught me that God exists, and He expresses himself as Love between people. The love I felt for Maa was a new awareness for me. It was an intuitive response to the gentleness that flowed out of her. There was no expectation, no doubt, no fear - only a sense of oneness that can only be experienced and not described. No she is not God, but her love most certainly is godly.

I am now a believer - I experienced the presence of God.