We're talking about City Center. You were saying that City Center was very strong when Richard was Abbott. Yeah, when Richard was in his prime at Sun Center, City Center was very strong. They had a lot of discipline. And then when he had his crisis, a lot of people left, and people were disillusioned. And a lot of people that stayed no longer wanted to... They didn't see any reason to keep the formality, which has always been a question. Unless you have some very strong reason for having formality, you start to question it. And so there was quite a bit of feeling of anarchy in the building. And a lot of people were staying there like it's a hotel. And they were not even practicing. When you first came there?

[01:01]

When I first came, it was Abbott in 88. And Richard had left in 83? Four or five. Four. And there was just this feeling. There were people just living there. There were a lot of people living there and criticizing Sun Center. And they came down for breakfast. It was beginning to be like a hotel. And there was very little demand on them. Or if there was, nobody followed up. So when I came, I started to tighten up the building. And at some point, I moved all the borders out. And there was some kicking and spinning. Because there were literally borders. I mean, there were people who lived there like guests, but they lived there all the time.

[02:02]

And they had no practice or work responsibilities. They just paid a fairly large sum of money to have the privilege of living at Sun Center. That's right. So there were a number of those people. And we haven't had that again for years. And so we moved there. And everybody that lived there had to have a practice. So we established a practice regimen for people. And then Michael, Paul, and Pat were... I think they had positions, but their positions were amorphous. They all did the same kind of... They all kind of overlapped each other in taking care of things. And so then I gave them positions. And they stabilized their positions.

[03:03]

And then... Paul really became tauntologist. Pat became director. Yeah. But they also had other positions, I think. I can't remember all their positions. But they interchanged positions from time to time. But then I started working with them as the main stage of the building. And little by little, they grew into directing the building and keeping it going. And then I introduced the orioke meal. I said nobody wanted to do that. And I said, it doesn't matter if there's only two people in Zendo. Just start out doing it. And then there were work days. And after a couple of years, the building started going. It started becoming an interesting place to practice. But my interest was never in pastry particularly.

[04:08]

Maybe because it was a building that was self-contained and there were no gardens around there. And... It was all contained inside. It was all contained inside. And there was... Although lay people came to Zazen... I don't mean lay people, non-residents came to Zazen. There was no feeling that there was a non-resident community that was part of the building. And it's never been that way. One of the biggest problems I had was being a non-resident abbot. What was that like? Well, I could stay overnight and... You used to come on Wednesday. I'd come on Wednesday and give a lecture on Wednesday night and then... Stay over? To have a class or go to Zazen or whatever, you know, meetings, lots of meetings on Thursday.

[05:18]

But I'd also come other days. But I wasn't a resident, you know. And one of the problems, one of the biggest problems of the building was that there were no resident officers. All of the practice leaders and officers lived outside the building. So there was an effort to try and get... As new officers came up, to try to have officers who were residents. Even though Pat, Paul and Michael were not. But all the other officers, Tenzo and Ina and the work leader and all the people should be residents. And that really helped a lot. There was a time when nobody knew who to go to, you know, when the practice leaders were home. Right. You know. And then we started having residence meetings where the residents could talk, you know. We could discuss the practice and things like that.

[06:20]

And so I wanted to bring in, you know, the residents and the non-residents in a more democratic way. Because since then it's been so autocratic. And Baker Oshii had, you know, dictated everything that was to happen. And everybody just kind of went along with that. It was a lot easier than having to think, you know, and discuss things. And so I wanted to discuss things. And I wanted people to decide, you know, share the feeling and create practice out of their, you know. They have some feeling of sharing the creation of the practice. Right. But aren't we leaving out a period of time? Because Richard Baker's advocacy ended. And then Reb was out of the Ebola Center. That's right. But for several years before you became cohabitants together. Right. So he lives across the street from the grocery store.

[07:21]

And he was abbot of the Zen Center. And he was, when I first came to the Zen Center in 1987, he was Beginner's Mind Temple abbot. And that's how we addressed him at Tate. So there's that whole period. Reb was really in charge of the practice at City Center. Right. And I didn't, I wasn't, you know, I wasn't integral with Zen Center that much at that time. So I can't really talk about it. So your memories are more from the Richard Baker years. And then you weren't there so much. And then you were invited to come to City Center and be cohabitant. I think in your earlier interviews, you originally were going to share the responsibility for all three places. So your original commitment was not to be abbot of City Center. My original commitment was not to be abbot of City Center. And I thought that we agreed that both Reb and I would be not in any particular place.

[08:23]

Not in any particular place, but we'd be able to all work from home. But as it worked out, Reb moved into... Reb took Green Gulch. Yeah, he moved into the house at Green Gulch. And then established him as the... So he kind of took the gem. And so I was left with City Center. And just fell that way. And so that was okay. I took, you know, I... But it must have been a little disappointing. That's not really what you wanted, right? Well, it's not exactly what I wanted. But I don't like commuting to the city. And I get the building, you know, it's conducive to meetings. And I just had so many meetings, you know, so many millions of meetings. I remember. Yeah. It was a shame. So, I mean, I enjoyed practicing with people.

[09:26]

That I enjoyed. But I think we got just too many meetings out. And that's one of the consequences, of course, of having a democratic system. And we were just evolving the democratic system. And spent the first five years cleaning up Richard Baker's karma. It's in there. You know, the things that he'd left, you know, that were problems. And that needed to, you know, get cleared up before we could just relax. So, there was a time when we were just, you know, putting out fires. By the middle of it, the city center stabilized. And the fires died out. And I think one of the things that we did, which I didn't like so much, was we kept...

[10:27]

We were very codependent with a lot of the students who should have been somewhere else. And we just kept them on, kept them on, long after we knew they should have left. And I think that was a big mistake. Because when you... I mean, there's something to take care of everybody. But I think it's important to know that there's limitations to who you can take care of. When I first started practicing here at Berkeley, I felt, well, I should be able to meet everyone, which is right. And figure out how to take care of your person, you know. But there are some people who take up so much time and energy that your whole time and energy is taken up with those people.

[11:30]

Exactly. And that's when you have to know when to move them on. Because there's some other place that's better for them than here. And I can't deal with everybody... I can't continue with everybody that way. So, I think we overextended that people... I've heard some people say that after about five years, students should really decide whether they're really going to really become deeply committed and involved in the practice and institution. And if they're not, then it's probably... they probably shouldn't do residential practice anymore. Well, I think that's true. But even before that... Even before... I mean, there were people who had deep schizophrenia problems, you know, and deep dependency problems. And they should never have been there and been allowed to be residents. Right. So, the other part that saddens me is that there's no real place for non-residents except those non-residents who really make a big effort to stay with the practice there.

[12:44]

But there's no way of reaching out to non-residents and offering programs for non-residents and having non-residents feel that they're part of, you know, that they're an integral part of. I know. It's actually as literal as you just said. When you said, there's no real place, and that's literally true. There's actually no room, all those rooms, there's 50 rooms there, but there's no one room where those people are received except for in the Zendaya and for a meal in the dining room. But there's not a lounge or anything where they're really invited to be together with each other and with other people in the community. Right, exactly. And the residents feel that they, you know, it's their home and they don't want people invading. Right. And so that's kind of a problem. Whereas at Greenbelt and Tonsahara, you have all these outdoor areas, you have many more physical places where people can have companionship with one another.

[13:47]

Right, but Greenbelt has its problems too. Yeah. In that way. But I asked Michael, before he became president, I asked Michael to be the outside, the non-resident liaison. And he was starting to do that, you know, to greet people at the door and to, you know, and then he became president. And then he couldn't do that in some way, anyway. So that kind of fell, liaison used to do it to some extent. When he was first there, he was very outgoing, very friendly. When he was first there as director, he had a lot of energy for that. How about, do you have, do you see some things that you think would kind of vitalize or revitalize the practice?

[14:49]

I mean, it's really has come back to life. I mean, it's grown so much over the last so many years. But still there might be elements, new elements of things that need to be introduced or, you know, what do you think? Well, I think that it'd be good to put a picture, more pictures in the hallways. I was thinking of putting some pictures up there. Pictures of what? Well, you know, drama pictures or pictures of something, you know, that's interesting. People or calligraphy or nature or something. I remember when you were at it that you asked us to have a newsletter just for City Center. We had it, we created, I brought it with you. We had what's happening. Right. It's fallen away. Yeah, it fell away. But it would be good to continue it because it was interesting.

[15:50]

Maybe Blanchville. Well, usually the secretary takes care of it. Right, but it needs to, somebody in that, somebody in an office. And then Jeffrey did it, the secretary. Did he? He did it. And Linda could do it. No, it was the person who was the head. We did it as head of the front office, actually. Oh, yeah? Yeah. What's happening, the new sheet, yes. Then there was something else that Vicki used to work on for you. Not Zen Inc. Zen Inc. That was different. That was a long time ago. There was something else, a different thing that was done by the board secretary. Well, that was the newsletter. Okay. Well, there were two things, but we won't discuss them. We'll talk about them later. They're two different things. What's happening was a sheet that told people who were coming into the building what was going on,

[16:57]

when the lectures were, what the classes were and everything. It was really, it was all events. Whereas the other one that you just were describing that Jeffrey and Vicki actually were the board secretaries who worked on that, they just had more informative articles. They had short articles and would have a nice note from you to the community. Yes. I just don't remember. And both of those are gone. Yeah. Both of them are gone. They should both continue. Right. Was it hard to come in and establish it in a situation where you had a lot of senior students who were pretty entrenched in their positions? Did you feel, was it easy to get started and be able to do the things that you wanted to do? They really were happy to have me there. Great. And that they were eager to do stuff. Uh-huh. And there were a few students who later were suspicious of me or didn't trust me, and I couldn't understand where that was coming from. I just could not understand why someone would not trust me and what it was that they wouldn't trust me.

[18:01]

You know, what? You know. But other than that, I felt like everybody wanted me to do something, and they were all happy to participate. Uh-huh. Yeah. How is city practice different than practice at... Actually, I want to ask something different. Straight up. Kind of what happens is that city center is kind of like a quasi-monastic practice. The people who train at Tassajara... Most people who run city center are people who have trained at Tassajara. So we have a semblance of the Tassajara practice. We have some elements of it, but yet it's also a city center. It's always said the other two places, Greek culture and Tassajara, have their own identities, but city center doesn't have a strong identity. It's a little bit like Tassajara, but not exactly. How do you feel about it having its identity? I think it has its own identity. What is it? But it doesn't have...

[19:04]

You know, Gringotts hosts all these people... No. ...on Sunday. Uh-huh. And they have a farm. So, you know, there are a lot of things that have this identity. The identity of city center is Azen. You know? And I think that it would be good to have programs for non-residents. And they do. Actually, you know, they started doing the short practice periods and inviting non-residents to do that, right? Uh-huh. But I think it would be good to have more something for non-residents. Uh-huh. And for the non-residents and the residents to have more interaction somehow. That would be good. And, you know, for somebody, you know, who is a resident, like, you know,

[20:06]

like a Tonto or something, to actually go to people's houses and offer incense and chant, you know, and offer incense at their altars. To go for people who are non-residents. Yeah. To kind of go out. Visit them in that way. Make it personal and to extend the practice center to the person's house. Yeah. Yeah, it would be good. It would be good. And acknowledge them as a practitioner in their home. Yeah. Validate their home practice. That would be great. A Tonto who just, part of his practice is to do that. Uh-huh. You know, to just go out to people and talk to them, you know, talk to their families. That would be good. Well, Tia is going to be Tonto next, right? At City Center. Is that true? She's the kind of person who could do that. Yeah, she could do that. She'd be friendly. Yeah. Are we finished recording?

[21:07]

Do you want to say anything else as part of this record? Um, well, coming back to City Center after being gone for actually a couple of years, you know, the one year of sabbatical, and then the year before sabbatical, I wasn't around there a lot doing stuff, you know. And now, going back the other day, it was very nice to go back to City Center and to talk to someone all morning, have a meeting. Yeah. You know. It was nice. Right. I liked it. And we liked you, too. We liked having you here again. It's been a song.

[21:56]

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