An engagement party in Vacaville we had already said yes to — the two of us, weeks ago, before the universe decided to schedule everything else on the same Sunday. Vineeth’s Pellikoduku and Swami Sarvapriyananda’s discourse in Sacramento were scheduled at the same time on the same day. We wanted to be at all three. We went where we had committed first.
Let me tell you about our Sunday.
We were on the I-80 by mid-morning, heading to Vacaville, Bhagavad Gita playing, cruise control set, the Sacramento Valley opening up around us in that particular way that makes everything feel both unhurried and slightly guilty.
Guilty, because we knew what was happening back home while we drove.
Swami Sarvapriyananda — if you don’t know him, stop what you are doing and find his Bhagavad Gita podcasts immediately; I will wait — was giving a discourse today. The man has a gift that borders on unfair. He takes the most vertiginous ideas in Vedanta, the kind that make your head spin if you look at them directly, and delivers them
with such calm precision that you find yourself nodding along, thinking, yes, of course, the individual self is identical with universal consciousness, obviously, why didn’t I see that before. He is that good.
We were not there.
We were also not at Vineeth’s Pellikoduku. For those unfamiliar, Pellikoduku is the Telugu groom’s pre-wedding ceremony — the equivalent of the North Indian Haldi, but with its own particular grace. It is held at the groom’s home, and it is the parents who perform it — applying turmeric and sandalwood paste to their son, blessing him, marking the moment he steps from one life into another. There is something deeply moving about that specific image: a mother and father, turmeric in hand, sending their boy into his future. The marigolds are orange and yellow. The music is playing. The aunties have arrived with opinions and blessings in equal measure.
Vineeth’s family was doing all of this today. We were not there for any of it.
Three events. All joyful. All worthy. All simultaneous. The universe has a scheduling system, and we do not understand it.
Neha’s engagement party — our friend Divya’s daughter, her own upcoming wedding rituals, a whole beautiful world of Tamil and Punjabi cultures — that invitation came
first, weeks ago, and we said yes. So we went. Not because the other things mattered less. But because a commitment made is a commitment kept. Chapter 2 of the Gita turned out to be excellent highway listening. Krishna’s argument that the self is neither born nor does it die is a surprisingly steadying thought at 85 miles per hour. And the Gita was itself, we should remember, delivered under conditions of impossible scheduling — Arjuna had somewhere to be and was having a full existential crisis about going. Krishna’s answer was not “perhaps reschedule.” It was: this is your dharma. Show up. Do the thing. The fruits are not yours to determine.
The fruits are not yours to determine. Krishna said this on a battlefield. We took it on the I-80. Same principle, slightly different traffic.
We arrived in Vacaville turmeric-free, podcast-nourished, and genuinely glad to be there.
The room was full of silk sarees and gold jewellery and the particular warmth of a community gathered to bless two young people stepping into something new. Divya was radiant. Neha was radiant. And Grandma Rajni looked like a bride. The food was exceptional.
Vineeth, we hope the Pellikoduku was everything — your parents’ hands steady and warm, the turmeric bright, the room full of people who love you. Swamiji, we hope the discourse was transcendent. We were doing our dharma on the I-80, listening to your podcast, at a speed the Gita would probably describe as neither too fast nor too slow.
The universe was generous today. Just entirely without regard for logistics.
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