Not a devotee..

Kids are very good with using KC concepts to their convenience and I experienced in this instance the meaning of the word 'boomerang.' I had been listening to the series of classes on Brahma Samhita by HH Mahanidhi Swami and time and again I marveled at the poetic eloquence of Lord Brahma. Listening to the descriptions of the spiritual world and Lord Krishna I began appreciating the artists in our movement, especially some who painted such wonderful pictures of Sri Radha Krishna merely by listening to descriptions by Srila Prabhupada. In the Brahma Samhita Lord Brahma describes Krishna thus:

The matchless beauty of Krishna, the Supreme Lord of Goloka, is being described. Krishna, the all-pervading cognition, has a spiritual form of His own. The form of Krishna is not a fanciful creation of imagination formed after visualizing the beautiful things of the world. What Brahma saw in his ecstatic trance of pure devotion, is being described. Krishna is engaged in playing upon His flute. That flute by his enchanting musical sound attracts the hearts of all living beings. Just as a lotus petal produces a pleasant sight, so the two beautiful eyes of Krishna who causes the manifestation of our spiritual vision, display the unlimited splendor and beauty of His moonlike face. The loveliness that adorns His head with peacock feather figures, the corresponding feature of the spiritual beauty of Krishna. Just as a mass of blue clouds offers a specifically soothing, pleasant view, the complexion of Krishna is analogously tinged with a spiritual dark-blue color. The beauty and loveliness of Krishna is far more enchanting that that of Cupid multiplied a million fold.
Based on these descriptions I came to an inference that all the nice pictures of Krishna can be made only by devotees or only devotees can understand the beauty of Krishna and therefore represent his beauty and other opulences in a fair manner. As I was thinking so, some relatives of my husband presented our daughter with a Dasavatara set made of wood. Krishna in the Dasavatara set lacked His usual Tribhanga pose and was short stumpy and unlike Krishna..I commented to my daughter- "Only devotees of Krishna can make a replica of Krishna at least somewhat perfectly." This found a place among her gray cells.

Soon it was Janmastami, it was my turn to makeover a plastic doll to resemble little baby Gopal for a diorama. I was perplexed. Here was this somewhat disproportionate doll staring at me. How on earth am I going to make it look like Krishna. The search for paint began, Krishna is blue not peach complexioned. Armed with a Krylon blue spray I set to work, the result was a disastrous looking blue child. All my hours of hard labor was ruined.. I then realized Krishna is not the material black color. How could something in the material blue/black color be even slightly appealing, what to speak of being all attractive? Praying fervently I set to work again and came up with a lighter shade of blue, painted the eyes, hair, made the clothes, put the jewelry on. I tried to fashion shark shaped earrings with sculpey clay, but some how it did not work. My daughter walked by took one look at Him and said " Amma, you know you are not a devotee." Swallowing my pride even I had to agree with her on this one..