Chapter 9December 26, 1972

(Mother plunges in for forty minutes,

Satprem slightly touches her hand to call her back)

Did you feel something?

I feel very comfortable.

(Mother laughs and takes Satprem’s hands)

Yes! The trouble is that everything else is rather unpleasant!

(Mother sees some teachers from the school. Towards the end of the meeting, Pranab enters Mother’s room in his customary manner, heads straight for Mother, and launches into a violent diatribe against some French television reporters – whom Mother had received the day before – because they filmed

Sri Aurobindo’s tomb “in spite of his orders.” Mother tries to calm him down.)

When they [the reporters] cannot get something from one person, they go to somebody else – and it works. In any event, I won’t see them anymore.

(Pranab explodes:) If I meet them again, I’ll smash their cameras.

I don’t want any violence or nasty scenes here.

(Pranab retreats to the other end of the room,

muttering angrily)

(Mother sits with her head in her hands) I have worked all my life so people would become a little conscious. But this violence....

(Mother turns to one of the teachers with a kind of distress in her voice)

People say that I am old, that I can’t speak, that I am senile, but the consciousness has never been so clear.... One minute of silence and....