Appointment with Shiva…

One recent morning I was riding to Ramana Ashram along Bangalore Road when I saw ahead of me a stationary public bus and a swelling crowd, including policemen and their vehicles—clustering around a white female lying motionless in a vermilion pool of blood on the side of the road. From a distance she looked so like a close friend of mine that I let loose a silent scream and involuntarily hit the brakes—right in the middle of the road.

A grim policeman waved me over to the side. I obeyed like a robot, struck dumb by a mélange of dark emotions. A cop who seemed to be in charge asked if I knew the dead girl—he wanted me to identify her. They had no clue, of course, what a coward I am in certain visceral ways. Too shaken to look at her face, I suggested instead that we identify her by inspecting the contents of her bag. Inside her faded cloth bag, we found a diary and a cell phone. And so we discovered that the name of this lovely girl, killed by a bus driver in a lethal hurry to reach his destination, was Miriam Franziska, and that she had recently arrived here from Berlin in order to savor the varied pleasures of Tiruvannamalai.

The last time I had witnessed such a death was as a teenager in Bangalore, when, right before my horrified eyes, a lorry hit a motorbike head-on: a sight ghastly beyond description because the victim flew into the air with the impact. I had screamed then too, and closed my eyes for long moments, although I was driving and my little nephew was with me. Fortunately our guardian angels too were hovering, or there would surely have been more fatalities due to my unhinged behavior.

Coming on top of so many deaths in my personal life—two beloved brothers who died in separate tragic accidents, both my parents, several close friends, a surrogate mother who suffered a fatal heart attack while driving her car in Washington DC, and more who shall remain nameless—I find that I have become both immunized to distant death and highly vulnerable to the passing of those whose lives come to an end so abruptly and brutally.

This twenty-three year old had made a note about a yoga class she planned to take on the second page of her diary…this is what I think I saw anyway, since my eyes were blurred with tears. It was a class she never would take, I remember thinking bleakly. So much unfinished business…so many joys and sorrows missed…and yet, her physical existence came to end in the shadow of the sacred hill Arunachala, whom millions consider the living embodiment of the Great God Shiva, the Destroyer in the Indian pantheon. It is said that to die here is a wondrous blessing…which leaves me with the lingering thought that only the Omniscient know for sure why the Destroyer stole back this beauty’s soul in so cruel a fashion—in the time and the place that He did. In the world of the Spirit, there are no accidents.

I have been praying for her family ever since—I know from personal experience that it is blood relatives who suffer the most excruciating knife thrusts of grief. Spirits set free by Death, unless reborn instantly, are no longer subject to the pangs of earthly life; it is the ones left behind who have to come to terms with their passing. My heart goes out to all those who will miss the living flame of Miriam’s presence.

Later that day, I thought of a young woman who is still trying to make peace with a tragedy that happened over a decade ago. She is alive and breathing and definitely on a spiritual path, and yet she refuses to speak or connect with other humans; her constant unrelieved mourning has turned her into a zombie. And this vital young Berliner, who had probably lived life to the fullest and yearned to plunge into more rich adventure, is no more in her physical body. Such is the irony of life on this incredibly disturbing planet.

Ultimately death is a wake-up call to make the most of our precious human lives—for no one but the sage knows when the end will come. As Don Juan said to Carlos Castaneda, we must live as if Death is looking over our shoulder; far from being morbid, this is the most perfect advice a spiritual master can provide.

Buddhists have a Death Meditation covered in three simple points: 1) that death is certain for all beings; 2) that the time of death is uncertain—babies die, teenagers die, adults die, the old die—we have no fixed lifespan; 3) and that when we die, all that remains is our eternal consciousness. The point, of course, is to focus on what is truly important while we still have a physical instrument at our disposal—rather than to waste our incredible potential by, say, amassing wealth or seeking fame and status in an ephemeral world.

It made me so happy to hear from a friend who knew Miriam and admired her artwork (yes, Miriam was an artist and a singer) that she was a gentle and talented woman who was certainly not wasting her time on earth. Her passing makes me realize yet again why it is vitally important that I watch how I live—for as I live, so shall I die. May Arunachala hold you in his embrace, beloved Miriam, and whisk you away to a realm of consciousness way beyond all mortal concerns.

Greetings from the sacred mountain Arunachala, who reveals to those who are willing to transcend the mundane that we are much more than body, mind, emotions and personal history—that we are no less than the Absolute, the Self, whose nature is pure existence, pure consciousness and pure bliss!

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