Ram Dass visited St. John many times.

This is a story of how I came to know Ram Dass. We have met in person but I am referring to when he was first introduced into my life.

I was living in a van with my boyfriend in 1980. We would winter in Key West then drive slowly up North visiting friends and any cool park along the way. Someone gave us the book “Be here now”. My biggest memory is sitting on a picnic table at a Gainesville college campus reading the book and being blown away with the deep insights that were totally mind expanding to both of us. We were so young with such a free lifestyle. We just soaked all the Ram Dass energy right up.

About 12 years later “Grist for the Mill” was delivered by a spirit. My partner’s mother died. On the plane ride home from St Kitts, the island his mother spent her entire life living on until the day of her death, he found a book left behind by a previous passenger. He brought it home. It was “Grist for the Mill” by Ram Dass.

This was odd for two reasons.

#1) this book is all about death and how we relate to death. It felt like his mother was comforting him.

#2) The fact that he actually brought it home. Starbo doesn’t really deal with anything that doesn’t belong to him. He grew up with a West Indian background. The only used stuff they would take was from close family. He would frown if someone gave me hand-me-downs for the kids. Whereas, I grew up getting excited about free stuff. Also Starbo is not much of a book reader but yet he brought this book home.

What are the odds that this book would appear in the very seat he was assigned; sounds like a message from somewhere ethereal.

I first met Ram Dass after hearing him speak on a hill overlooking the Caribbean ocean. It was when the Christ of the Caribbean statue was still at Peace Hill. The air was fresh and the sky blue. It was a gorgeous day, not unlike most days in St John. There were over a hundred people on that small hill. I have no recollection of the question I asked but I remember the warm smile I was delivered and the gentle handshake I received.