Those early days in the early 70's in Boston at the Brighton temple were really magical. Maybe I can find some photos of Radha gopiballava from then. Radha's face was decorated to looked an awful lot like Marilyn Monroe. The way Her face was painted. Very red lips...and She had a purse She carried. I've never seen that since.
The flowers for the altar were extra ordinary. They weren't store bought or commercially grown. My service was to go around the neighborhood door to door and beg for flowers for Krishna. I looked like a Nun or something and after a while I even had a wheel barrow. So the Deities had whatever was in season. In spring... flowering cherry tree blossoms, in summer zinnias, whatever was growing in the area. Vines, lilacs, forsythia, petunias, marigolds, roses....
One day I wandered a pretty far distance away in search of new territory. There was an empty lot over grown with all sorts of plants. There was also a significant number of small wild sunflowers.... the jackpot. It was a vacant lot. In I went wading through brambles and small bushes.
There were houses around the lot and one house quite a distance away had a large German shepherd chained up on the landing to the back boor. He didn't like me being there for sure. He was barking his head off. But hey, he was chained up.. so go ahead and bark.
He snapped the chain. In a furry and rage charged at me like a locomotive. He must have been running 40 mph straight for me all I could see were very large sharp teeth headed my way. There was no way to protect myself. I just stood there with my hand in my bead bag. Hare Krishna Hare Krishna.
He lunged at me and bit a hole in the bottom of the bead bag.
Luckily two young men were walking past and saw the situation. They rescued me and chased the dog away who was getting ready for another bite of "something."
The owner came out, apologized and took his dog home.
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