School of the flies and working girls

The ashram had its own school for its own misfits. Imagine a school full of children dressed in shades of red, unkempt and barefoot. Children who for the most part had never been given limits or rules - either because their parents thought that was the right thing to do, "the divine child should be free in his innocence, man!" or because their parents were too busy bettering themselves in encounter groups (beat each other up and bash pillows), primal groups (scream and discover why your childhood is to blame) or other meditations to know what their kids were up to throughout the day. These kids were wild. They were mean. They were in control. At least that's how i saw it on my first day at Hem Hira, the school. (I did think it was cool that we mostly shared a name)

There were some crafts and reading and some sort of loosely held lessons going on, but I didn't know anyone and I didn't fit in. I didn't like it. I had loved my regular old Huntington Elementary school with its orderly story time and free time for me to read, its crayons and paste. This wild free-for-all did not suit me at all. I attended school for exactly one day.

My Dad, on the other hand, was recruited to be one of the teachers. So after that first day, Daddy went to school and I went to work. I went to the ashram and found myself a job. I was a runner for Sushila, a loud haughty jovial and very loving woman who had been best friends with my mom when they were children. They rediscovered each other quite by accident at the ashram in Poona years later. Susie and Marci shrieked with delight to discover they were in the same place together, as Sushila and Premrup.

Sushila was the boss at the groups department, the department that oversaw the aforementioned groups and meditations. It was my job to be the runner, or messenger. Sushila thought i was delightful, and always introduced me as her friend, Hira "6 going on 36". I took that to be a great compliment, I was her compatriate! It was my job to deliver messages from her department to anywhere else on the ashram. It was a great responsibility, but there were few messages to deliver, so mostly I sat around in the office, making up stories and drawing pictures for my own books. The books I wrote were a perfect indication of the crossover between my old life and new one. Things that move: motorcycles, cars, school busses, and rickshaws. Diseases: chicken pox, measles, amoebas.

I did get a message to deliver every now and then, and depending on who it was for, I was either thrilled or terrified. I loved going to the main office because Vidya was there, and she adored me and often gave me sweets. I was terrified to deliver messages to Teertha, the pious, self-absorbed group leader, one of the high mucky-mucks in Poona. He didn't seem to like children, though he had a daughter slightly older than I was, and he took himself very seriously. Also, I had to deliver his messages to Lao Tzu, where Bhagwan lived, and I wasn't allowed in, so i always had to deliver it through a gate, which was intimidating, to say the least.

After some time, I did make some friends among the children, mostly others who didn't want to go to school, and I had an independent life inside the ashram gates with my own job and responsibilities. I had my own life and I loved it! By day, I was grown-up and busy. At night, I went home with Daddy and was still his little girl. What could be better?