spring!

dandavat pranams. March 20, Sunday, was the first day of spring and of course it snowed here in New Braj!  by the mercy of Sri Guru and Gauranga i am here at our mountain ashram, sitting in Srila Gurudeva's room and praying that he will keep me close.

we've just come off a 3 day power outage because of the big snow storm on sunday. the power outage, outrageously showed how dependent we are on electricity. no water, no lights, no washing machine, no bread machine, no heat in the garage...on the positive side we are using wood heat! yea! so we were warm and the kitchen stove is propane so it was cooking! we cooked with melted snow and washed with swimming pool water. so really it wasn't so bad except for the embarrassment of too much dependence on PG&E!

The plan is for New Braj to be self-sufficient in the near future. and if the enthusiasm continues here i'm sure that vision will be realized.

In the meantime Spring is making her appearance in NB! Spring here on the mountain is a major tug of war between Cruel Winter and Blazing Summer. We watch the fight every year and i always wonder who will win. It reminds me painfully of our situation as conditioned souls. with a major tug-of-war between the mind and senses and higher intelligence. i wonder who will win? ...but not for long because i know that our Gurudeva has planted pure bhakti in my heart and it will fructify if i follow because he said so!

posting from above the clouds at our New Braj, gopanandini dasi