Growing up with Meher Baba (Page 1 of 10)

When I think about how I came to Meher Baba all those years ago, it seems like a million years, at least. When I was young, my mother became very interested in the spiritual life, and she explored many groups at different times, and I went along, just taking an interest in what she was doing. But it wasn’t until she became interested in Sufism and also in Murshida Rabia Martin particularly, who I thought was a very sensible lady, that I became interested too.

About three years after I had become a Sufi, Mother had by then become the Murshida of the Order, and following a lead from Murshida Martin, she became interested in going to India to see Meher Baba. It just happened at that time — I was then in college — that my father, whose oil company had interests in the Middle East, suggested that we take a trip over there. He had to go on business, and Mother and I could go along. So she wrote to Baba regarding this, and I was set to go as well.

Charmian Duce Knowles in 1985.

Earlier, I had been at the house in Gramercy Park in New York where Elizabeth Patterson and Norina Matchabelli and other earlier devotees lived and gathered. They talked about Baba all the time, and I remember that after that first week I was left absolutely bubbling with enthusiasm. But when we went to Arabia I met a young man there and we became romantic. We were well chaperoned in those days. At that point I couldn’t quite see why I had to go running off to India to see some swami or yogi, or whatever this man might be, and I was very skeptical of my mother’s going. It was at the time of the Partition [between India and Pakistan], and I was very concerned about her safety. My father was even more concerned, but he couldn’t go, and it became apparent that I was the one who had to go along to take care of Mother.

So the arrangements were made and we left, finally arriving in Bombay on January 5, 1948, to be greeted at the airport by Meherjee Karkaria. He took us to our hotel and from there he planned to drive us up to see Meher Baba in Meherazad. Baba had very carefully scheduled every single minute of this trip and we were quite worried about traffic, India being what it is. In addition, Meherjee was desperately ill, but he insisted that if he could get to Baba he would be fine.

We left on the morning of January 7 and drove first to Poona where we rested for an hour per Baba’s instructions. We went into the railroad station, and I was shown into a big room that I think was a ladies’ waiting room. There were long wooden benches, and I remember sleeping on that bench for about an hour. We later pulled up to a little town and then drove out in the country with mostly farmland, with lovely waving crops in the winter sunshine, and finally we came to a big gate where Meherjee stopped the car. From there we took our bags and walked across to the compound and were shown to a lovely little room in one of the houses where we were to stay during our visit. Baba had wanted us to arrive at three o’clock. It was now exactly three.