Old fashioned roses.

Two years ago, when my sister Dolly visited me for the first time in 20 years we went to the local garden centre and bought an old fashioned rose. In India these roses are called 'Gauthi Gulab' i.e. 'Native Roses'. The tag on the plant called mine 'Persian Rose'. Whatever the name, they were Baba's favourite. He loved the scent and the colour, which matched His favourite pink coat. This story is posted in the same colour. After two years of not too much action, this year the rose bush is covered with fragrant, pink blossoms. It brought to mind the time when Beloved Baba dropped His body.

There was some concern about getting enough flowers to lay over His form as it rested in the crypt at Meherabad. But suddenly, all the flower farms in and around Ahmednagar overflowed with these roses. There was no shortage of the fragrant blooms to cover His body. It was as if the rose bushes knew that this was their opportunity to be of service to the Highest of the High, and made an all-out effort to do just that.

For seven days the flowers came in by the bagfuls, and were offered as blooms, garlands, jalis (a woven 'sheet' of roses) in the Tomb. In those days there were meditation cabins alongside the Tomb, where now the graves of Mani and the other women are. The cabins were crammed with the flowers and we used to take the roses as they came off Baba's body and preserve them. We took them home and made 'gulkand', which is a kind of rose preserve, and we ate this for years after - His final Prasad. Mansari too made gulkand which she would dole out from time to time. Others dried the flowers, and kept them as family treasures. After His body was interred the flowers stopped blossoming as suddenly as they had begun.

Meher Baba did not perform miracles. Miracles happened around Him. The roses were nature's way of paying a final homage to His physical form, and what a beautiful tribute it was!!!

Avatar Meher Baba Ki Jai.