Dormitories at Yogaville today are plain, but comfortable, something on the order of a spiritual Motel 6. When I lived there, to say the accommodations were “spartan” would be a very charitable description.
I shared an antique mobile home with three other men. My quarters were the largest room in the trailer, the former kitchen at the very front. I felt very lucky to have this room, and only for a moment pondered why one of the other men had given it up for a smaller room at the back. It wasn’t until winter that I found out why he moved.
Our trailer was one of the oldest and most decrepit on the property. The monthly winter fuel bill for this trailer was the highest for the whole ashram. Because none of the windows or doors were tight, and there was almost no insulation in the so-called walls, it leaked heat like blood from the proverbial “stuck saint”.
My quarters were the farthest from the trailer’s creaky furnace, and I can't remember that there any ducting into my room. If so, it didn't deliver any heat. Given that any warmth in my end had to first wander past the ill-fitting door to the outside world, my quarters were like Antartica without the company of penguins. There was also a former stove vent in the wall right above my bed. This had cute little shutters worked by a pull chain, but even with the shutters closed there was always a frigid draft in winter. I had yet to learn about that miracle material, duct tape. During the winter I lived there, a huge pile of blankets kept me warm at night.
Still, I was pleased with the room. It had a tiny closet, space for a small altar, and I added a couple of bookshelves. My bed was the upper part of an old bunk bed set, and stood well up from the floor. There was room underneath to store several boxes of my modest household goods and other stuff. The room had everything I could ask for, except warmth.
One reason our trailer was so cold was the mice who lived inside the walls. They had carried off lots of the already inadequate insulation material to line their nests. At night I could hear the little beasties gnawing at the aluminum siding, or whatever else mice do at night to keep tired yogis awake. So I bought a Victor Steel Cat, a humane repeating mouse trap, which I placed just inside the door each night. In the morning on the way to work, I would take the trap and the night’s catch a couple of miles down the road and turn the mice loose. Probably none of the mice found their way back, but there were always plenty more where they came from.
The Sadhana Room at the Hunting Lodge was where Swami-ji held satsang. It also was our meditation hall and yoga studio in the early days. The building is deeper than it looks, but we had already outgrown the space. The room is still used for retreat programs.
Every morning, except when I was cramming for a test at the local community college, I rose in time for 5:00 AM meditation in the hunting lodge. This was often a lonely vigil. Usually there were one or two swamis, one being the pujari who lit the altar lights and led the prayers. There would sometimes be an overnight guest or two. Often it was just the pujari and myself. Or sometimes just myself, so I lit the lights and chanted the prayers alone. The missing swamis, and most lay members, preferred to do their morning prayers alone at altars in their quarters. Some of them were, no doubt, catching a few extra Zs.
I never complained about the lack of meditators, but somebody else must have. From time to time Swami-ji would hear about this, and order everyone to meditate together, especially the swamis, who he said were supposed to set an example for the rest of us. So for a couple of weeks morning meditation would be well attended. Then things slipped back to ashram-normal.
We had to put up with occasional arachnid wildlife in the meditation hall, so a container was kept at the ready, marked “Spider Remover” for obvious reasons. One morning as I was meditating eyes-open, I spotted a enormous spider working its way along the wall. It must have been almost two inches across, though mostly legs. One of the swamis sitting nearby was also watching the creature's progress with a horrified look on her face. When meditation ended, she immediately jumped up and ran for the spider remover. The critter was summarily ejected from the building.
Food at the ashram was vegetarian (of course), usually plain and always wholesome, but boring. As Swami-ji once observed, “You didn’t come here to eat cookies.” Meat, fish, poultry and eggs were banned. Also on the hit list were white flour, white sugar, white rice, salt, butter and most other dairy products (yogurt and some milk were allowed).
Breakfast usually consisted of some really tasty homemade bread, freshly baked the night before. This was cooled on a “mouse-proof” metal rack outside the kitchen. One day I discovered a loaf with a six-inch deep hole bored by mice. So much for "mouse proof". I swore off the bread after realizing that the mice had probably crawled all over this and the other loaves, dribbling their little . . . uh . . . calling cards everywhere.
The mice became such a problem in the kitchen that drastic measures had to be taken, and one of the swamis proudly unveiled his proverbial “better mouse trap”. This consisted of a mop bucket and a narrow plank forming a ramp. A piece of bread with peanut butter was the bait, and a thin coating of peanut butter was applied to the plank as well. The mice were expected to climb up the ramp and drop into the bucket. The trap worked great on the first night, but the swami made the mistake of using a plastic bucket. In the morning the bucket was empty, with a mouse-sized hole chewed through the side.
The alternative to mouse-bread was puffed cereal. This was almost always puffed millet, which has a taste vaguely like cardboard, and is just about as appealing. I didn’t find out why we ate so much puffed millet until I worked at the ashram’s natural foods store in town. Every few days the head cook would provide the store manager with a grocery list, including a generic request for several bulk bags of cereal. Naturally, the store manager sent what we had the most of, and since almost nobody in the world willingly eats puffed millet, that’s what he chose. How else could he get rid of this stuff? Puffed rice or puffed wheat occasionally appeared at the ashram, but were gone almost as soon breakfast began.
Bagels were another rare treat. Since more than half the ashram residents were ex-pat New Yorkers, and most of them of Jewish descent, bagels disappeared like dew before the sun as soon as the word got around.
Coffee was an ashram dietary no-no. Even decaf was banned. There were, however, said to be a couple of trailers where secret pots were fired up every morning. People in the know, swamis included, could sneak in for a cup of this life-bestowing elixir. Since I hadn’t yet embraced the coffee habit, I never found out where the good stuff was.
Our main meal was lunch, self-served, and cafeteria style. One could load up a generous heap of food, though a somewhat bland one. The most common meal was tofu baked in tamari sauce, unmilled short-grain brown rice, and a cooked vegetable, frequently steamed broccoli. A light soup and tossed salad rounded out the menu.
Ashram residents who worked at our natural foods store in town were offered a free lunch (non-resident employees could also buy in for a modest price). Our sandwich-maker was also the lunch cook. Since the sandwiches were one of the store's most profitable sales items, they had to be made, wrapped and in the cold case before lunch. Only then could the cook prepare lunch for the staff. The regular sandwich-maker usually took the easy way out, and almost every day made tofu baked in tamari sauce, unmilled short-grain brown rice, and steamed broccoli. Sound familiar? On the regular sandwich-maker’s day off, her replacement would cook us lo mein, a wonderful change.
On my mid-week day off, I ate lunch at the ashram. Or at least tried to. That was fast day, when almost nothing but an ungarnished tossed salad and thin soup was served for both lunch and dinner, even for those who weren’t fasting. Later I changed my day off, but the ashram shifted their fast day, again to match my day off, so I stayed hungry. That's called "food karma". Why I didn’t hide a stash of food in my trailer is beyond me; maybe respect for the rules. The mice would probably have found it anyway.
After lunch there was sometimes a small caravan of cars headed off the ashram grounds to the nearest country store for a Pepsi and a Hershey bar or other forbidden goodies. I gladly joined this motorcade in quest of a sugar high and a full tummy.
A sugar rush was far from our minds when most of the natural foods store staff were recruited to run a concession stand at the LOTUS dedication day, 20 July 1986. We sold bottled water and health-food brand fizzy drinks to our guests. With the temperature at 95 degrees, the stand did a land-office business and was almost sold out by mid-day. An emergency trip to the store brought all the drinks left in the warehouse and on the shelves back to the LOTUS and kept us going until the end of the event. The staff were encouraged to drink as much as we could to stay hydrated, and I downed down over a dozen sodas. The work was so frantic and I was sweating so heavily that I never noticed a sugar high.
The Light of Truth Universal Shrine (LOTUS) in 2017. It is an ecumenical temple to the Light of God that is mentioned in nearly all scriptures. The temple was Swami Satchidananda's crowning achievement.
We rotated out from the concession stand from time to time for a break, but I missed the speeches by the dozen or so notable spiritual leaders who were guests. I was able to watch Swami Satchidananda anoint the temple from a helicopter with water, milk and holy ash, for me the defining moment of the whole dedication ceremony.
The upper level sanctuary in LOTUS contains altars representing all of the world’s great religions in a circle facing a central altar dedicated to the Light of God. My favorite meditation spot was, and still is, beside the altar representing Buddhism. I spent a peaceful half-hour there during a break from selling drinks on dedication day.
My salary at the natural foods store was low, and I had some pretty stiff financial obligations, plus paying room and board to the ashram. To make ends meet, I burned up my GI Bill benefits with night classes at the local community college. The government checks were generous enough to keep me afloat after paying for tuition and books. What it couldn’t cover was a new auto. My truck had blown out several successive head gaskets, and the odometer was approaching 160,000 miles, but I couldn’t afford to replace it. In addition, my round-trip commute was almost 100 miles a day, a major fuel expense.
My adventure as an ashram resident ended after about ten months. One night I massacred a suicidal deer on the way home from school. The accident was fatal for the deer. It was nearly fatal for me as well, as the truck stopped just a few feet short of rolling down a steep embankment.
Getting the truck put back together took six weeks. During that time, I tossed and turned in my sleeping bag 0n the natural foods store's office floor. I only got back to Yogaville on my day off and on Sundays, when I was able to do laundry by skipping morning meditation.
I learned that several of my fellow devotees were searching for a housemate to share quarters. I jumped at the chance to move to town, and joined them as soon as my truck was repaired. I left the ashram with deep regrets, and feel that my time there was among the best years . . . er . . . months of my life. Of course, this wasn’t the end, since I was still able to participate on weekends, especially when Swami-ji was in residence.
