One of the things that always frightens me about giving Saturday morning talk is partly the echo we do first. And I remember, no one else seems to remember this or can tell me where I read it or heard it, that there is a description that a person who speaks the Dharma without understanding it is like a beautiful woman who smiles and then her teeth are filled with black sesame seeds. Such a terrible image that I very carefully floss my teeth. I often have trouble when I arrange these talks I'm not skilled at making the bridges between the things that I know there's a bridge for that are very closely related in my head, but I can't always bring the pieces of the talks together so that they make sense to other people.

[01:21]

And the times that I have been able to, it's usually when I can find a visual image to speak about a nine-patch quilt and the pieces that make it or some kind of mandala or some kind of image. But unfortunately, this time, as I looked for an image that would bring the pieces together, the image got bigger and bigger until it became that of Indra's neck. So I'm going to read to you A brief description, which is not the most poetic of Indra's net. It is said in the Huayen Sutra, that's also another name for the Avatamska Sutra or the Flower Ornament Sutra, that high above in heaven on the roof of the palace of the god Indra, there hang innumerable ornaments in the form of small crystal marbles.

[02:30]

They are interlaced in various patterns, forming a great complex network. Because of the reflection of light, not only does each and every one of these marbles reflect the entire cosmos, including the continents and the oceans of the human world down below, but at the same time, they reflect one another. including all the reflected images and each and every marble without omission. So that's a rather large image, but maybe you can be able to see the interconnectedness, even if I can't describe it. These last weeks have been difficult for me in many ways, but they've also been very joyful and just filled with Dharma gates, with great opportunities to learn about myself and to the others around me and my practice.

[03:51]

And I think one of the things May Lee requested, and may have come out of some of my experiences of the last weeks, is she asked me to speak about age. And people, she kindly said our age, though she's a few years younger than I. And she included Mel, who's a few years older than I. And I found some resistance to this. And I think part of my resistance is probably in denial of my age. But the other part is that I often feel people are stereotyped because of their age. And I tend to think more in time. And whenever we think about age, we also think about No old age and death and also no extinction of it.

[04:57]

At least when we've been practicing around here, we say that practically every day, either in English or in Japanese. But anyway, I look at it differently, I think. I remember Long ago, about the first year or two I was practicing, there was a young man who just thought very highly of me. And one day he said, Rebecca, I would like to find someone just like you, but 10 years younger, so they'd be my age. And I said to him very sweetly, well, that's a great compliment. I take that very kindly. And inside my head, I was thinking, good luck, kid. You're not going to find anyone like me that's the same age as I. One of the wonderful things that has happened in terms of age to our family in the last month is last month, my sister-in-law Dorothy, who is 64, got her PhD.

[06:09]

and reopened her offices, which she had closed for a while, her therapy offices. And I just think it's a wonderful image of what people do when they're 64, just because they're doing it. And then I think about our cultural bias about age and how I'm not very deeply aware of how much I have that same bias, or I wasn't until about a year ago, when, well, for background, I have to explain that the age of 88 is a great age among Japanese, because both 11 and 8 have some kind of special meaning in all kinds of systems that I don't understand. But 88 is the year that you celebrate, family celebrate for the person who is 88.

[07:19]

And it's an age when you're supposed to be not supposed to have to do anything more except let people enjoy you. Your work sort of is done. Anyway, we were at this party and my mother-in-law, who is 93 now, and Her friend, who had just celebrated her 88th birthday, and these people had known each other literally for generations. I mean, their great-grandchildren know each other now. Mrs. Otani turned to my mother-in-law, Mrs. Mayeno, and said, oh, I didn't know you were older than I. And my mother-in-law turned back to her. I mean, Mrs. Otani had just become the young age of 88 when my mother-in-law was already 93. My mother-in-law turned back to me and said, Oh, I didn't know I was either because you look so much older than I do.

[08:28]

Well, my first responses were, these two bitches. And then I realized, now just a minute, step back. Because in the Asian culture, age is so venerated. And it really took me, I mean, it was one of those lightning experiences of my own cultural bias about age and how easy it is when Somebody says, oh, I didn't think you were that old, you know, to think, well, this is a compliment. But I'm reminded of a very attractive woman I know, who somebody said to her, oh, I didn't know you were 44. You don't look 44. And she said, I am 44, therefore I look 44, and that's what a lot of people like me, who are my age, look like.

[09:33]

And a lot of people look older, and a lot of people look younger. Anyway, nothing. Well, Mel and I, and May Lee and some others here, are fast approaching the age that Suzuki Roshi died at, which is 68. We have some years to go, but it is something that makes one think. And this morning, we did not the memorial service, but the Founder's Day service for Suzuki Roshi, and Suzuki Roshi's picture was on the altar. I was one of those people who was fortunate enough to be practicing when Suzuki Roshi was still alive, but though when he was already beginning to be sick, though no one quite knew what was going on.

[10:37]

And I'd like to share some memories of him. It was a really rich time at the Berkeley Zendo. and the zender wasn't here, it was on Dwight Way. But on Monday mornings, often, different teachers would come and talk. I see some heads nodding. Katagiri Roshi, Suzuki Roshi, coming with Okusan, and Yoshimura Sensei. I mean, Katagiri Roshi was Katagiri Sensei then, too. But we'd have, usually on Monday morning after the talk, we'd then have breakfast. There'd be six or seven or eight people just sitting around eating breakfast and being there and just having that presence, especially of Suzuki Roshi, who was just great. It didn't make any difference if he said anything or didn't.

[11:41]

It just was so alive. And then at that time also, I went to Tassajara during the summer, and at that point during the summer, Suzuki Roshi was giving talks every day. He was giving lectures, and he gave the lectures which a lot of us have read, and we keep seeing in our newsletters, the Sondokai lectures. and the lectures on the echoes around Sandukai. That was a great experience, just being around. And he was very busy building the gardens. And some people, Ed Brown, for instance, used to get just furious because he'd have people move these huge rocks, you know, with winches and brute force, and he'd stand there. And he'd have this whole crew of young men and moving them.

[12:44]

And he'd look at them very quietly and say, hmm, over five inches. And he'd start again. And I think it wasn't until after Suzuki Roshi was gone that we really began to appreciate what a teaching that was to be able to watch. Of course, I didn't have to mix with the rocks. But what difference and what care those five inches made as we still enjoy some of those rocks at Tassajara. I remember also from Tassajara, and I'm not sure whether it was that year or the next year, I think it must have been the next year because he was already being taken care of very carefully and by, and there was sort of a tenderness with every parting from him.

[13:52]

And the roads to Tassachar are very dusty, and he was sitting in this van, and Ivan was superintending the cleaning of all the windows, and the outside of this van was going to be immaculate. before it drove down that dirt road to get absolutely filthy in at least three seconds. And Suzuki Roshi sat inside in this glass box. And he was just sitting there very patiently, just very patiently, and almost all the students had gathered around were looking into this looking at him and just eating up this moment of seeing him. He was just sitting there looking straight ahead and just glowing. The sort of light came out of the van. It was always hard to remember how small he was. And of course, the van then drove off into the dust. In fact, before it even got to the main road, it was dirty again.

[14:55]

But it was great extra minutes for us to see him. One of the things that made me so greedy for practice was before he died, he gave chukai or lay transmission to many of his students. And I don't remember very much about the ceremony itself. What I remember was sitting in the dining room sitting around while he explained the names that he gave to people. He sat on this couch, but he sat in full lotus on a couch, you know, just with everything tucked up there. And he explained the translations and why he'd given the names. And the poetry was so great, and the thought and the knowledge of his students,

[15:58]

that was in each name, and puns, absolutely, you know, strange puns, that's right, puns. There was, it wasn't plum blossoms, it was actually peach blossoms, and there was a couple Actually, they were from Minnesota, but they'd come every year and practice with him. And both of their names were Chris. The male and the female were Chris. And he gave them both the name Peach Blossom or Peach Tree, but explaining that a peach tree that was in an orchard had a different name than a peach tree that was growing out in the open. And I was just so completely touched by that.

[17:06]

And there were just one after another. I wanted, I was so greedy for a name. And at that point, there were so many people who wanted to do Dukai, you had to be sitting for three years. And I was something like two or three months short of that. And I just wanted a name. To make it worse, Oka-san walked by and said to me, Suzuki Roshi should have given you a name too. Anyway. But I didn't get a name from him, but I got one from Baker Roshi and then finally a new one from Mel, which I feel is my name indirectly from Suzuki Roshi. Anyway, the other thing of my memory that I remember most about him was, in a way, it was more about myself.

[18:12]

We were sitting sashin when Suzuki Roshi died, and the bill started, and we knew he had died. Myself and Cam Burek were asked to, after Sashin was over, that people would sit Zazen with his body while people came, other people came, and they asked Cam and myself to sit for one day with him to represent Berkley-Zendon, to be our representatives there. And people from different centers each took a day. And the thing that I just, I couldn't believe how little he was. I mean, I felt like I could just pick him up like this.

[19:17]

He was so little. And he was so little in life, but he was so big. And it was just like, there was nothing left there. But oh, there's so much left for us. So much left. One other thing that I remember about him that, and say, Sheena, it's like one line coming out. And a lot of us were feeling very, very sad about him dying. He said, oh, no, it's all right. My suffering is just a drop in the suffering of Buddha. Well, going back to life and death and Suzuki Roshi. One of my wonderful memories about him was going with Anne Overton and we had a lot of

[20:24]

plum trees that had beautiful blossoms in our house. And Oka-san, Mrs. Suzuki, loved to do the flower arrangements. She would go out to collect branches. When they were pruning the trees in Golden Gate Park, she would go to the Japanese garden, and she would bring back these arms and arms of blossoms at that time. And at this time, when Suzuki Roshi was getting closer to dying, we knew that she wouldn't have the time to do it, so Anne and I went tiptoeing up, you know, with our branches of plum blossoms, peach blossoms or whatever they were, knocking, you know, very gently on the door. We didn't want to disturb Suzuki Roshi. And Hokusan opens his door and says, oh, come on in, come on in.

[21:29]

Roshi would like to see you. You know, and she's taking the branches and arranging them. And Hoisu was there, his son. And everybody is sitting around the table laughing. And he is just grinning. Suzuki Roshi is grinning and Hoisu is telling a joke in Japanese, which, of course, we didn't understand. Sit down, sit down, have some tea. and realized at that point how, in a way, we were killing Suzuki Roshi before he died, how he was ready to live in every moment to the last moment, and how much we do that to our own lives by predicting all the time, just moving into the future and killing that moment we're in.

[22:30]

We always talk about that, living in each moment and being with each moment, but somehow that brought it alive to me very much, that we were sort of in deep mourning and here he was alive and invited to share that life again. I'd like... I haven't been watching the time at all. Would you give some time for discussion? Sure. I'd like to share some other people's memories of him. This is from Yvonne Rand. I remember one time he had a bottle of painkillers that his doctors had prescribed. After much procrastination, he took one pill. About four hours later, he handed the bottle over and said, please throw them away.

[23:36]

Even though my doctors would feel better if I took them, I don't like what they do to my state of mind. The doctors who were treating him initially thought he had hepatitis, so Okasan and I went through all kinds of contortions to segregate his food and sterilize his dishes. This went on for eight long weeks. Eventually, test proved he didn't have hepatitis. He had gone to Mount Zion to figure out what was going on. One day, as I walked into his hospital room, two or three doctors were leaving. His lunch was on the table next to the bed, And he motioned me over next to him with a big grin. He mouthed, I have cancer. And proceeded to feed me. Now we can eat together again. I was so struck with his ease and his pleasure in being able to eat off the same plate again.

[24:41]

No matter what's the cause, being with him through his dying process was an experience of this is part of life. The other thing I've heard Yvonne say, and I've often heard people say, Blanche said it recently, those of you who were here in January for Blanche's lecture, that One of the things that gives you great faith in this practice was having the experience of being around people like Suzuki Roshi or Kadagiri Roshi. To have the experience of being around a completely realized person. And after one of those talks, or during Blanche's talk, somebody asked, as I remember this, about, well, if you don't have that, I think I'm moving this around, translating it a little.

[25:53]

If you don't have that experience, then what can you look to? Where can you look for that experience of all life being connected? one of the things she spoke about that seems to me to be the other part of that is that the great thing about him was that part of that was being able to see the Buddha nature in each of us, in each person, in each thing that he met. And it seems to me that that's sort of the answer, in a way, if we don't have that person around who is the completely realized, person with the obvious buddha nature glowing out of him at every moment we can see and look for the buddha nature in each of us in each of those around us and maybe that's the true strength of sangha And about a month ago, I damaged my knee.

[27:13]

And for about two days, I was just furious. I was furious with myself. I was furious with my body. And then I lost my glasses. And I'd already sort of, you know, made this little agreement with myself. I'm going to just take care of my knee. I'm just going to take care of it because the doctor had said, you know, take care of it and make it better. But this may be a chronic condition. It may only get worse and worse and worse. So I made this deal. I was just going to take care of my knee. And how was I going to take care of my knee? I was going to indulge myself. I was going to eat whatever I wanted to eat. And I was going to read and read and read. And of course, the first thing I did was to drop my glasses. I went into a total funk. You can't imagine the funk. We couldn't find them.

[28:16]

They were gone. And then when we did find them, as soon as we found them, the one lens was gone. I mean, we just knocked them out. I didn't know that's what had happened. Of course, when I found them, then I remembered I had a drawer full of old prescriptions that I could perfectly will. But I was just ready to be in a funk and sort of wrap myself in this kind of thing. And my knee has gotten better. And today I had the pleasure of actually getting down on the mat and getting up again without rolling on the floor. It's a great pleasure because that mat smells like Mel. There's all kinds of transmission. Anyway, one of the Dharmagates for me recently has been meditating with a friend who is in bed almost all the time, can occasionally be moved to his wheelchair, but can't sit up in it, really, he has to be reclining.

[29:38]

We did a well-being ceremony for him recently, and it was very hard not being able to get over to see him regularly, though I did quite often. But one of the things about Being with him, he asked to learn Zazen, and that's when I started going over there regularly. And I had to very carefully look at what our practice is. And we kept looking and looking and looking. No, he's not ever going to cross his legs. if he tries to follow his breathing, he has almost no feeling left there. And his breathing is very, very weak. And often people, for instance, who have asthma, following their breathing is a very difficult practice because it just creates sort of a...

[30:50]

the panic that can lead to more asthma attacks. So we kept looking and looking and looking for the next thing to do. And as we looked, I had to keep looking at what is my practice. We talked so much about that little cushion And I talk to a lot of people. I talk to people who work with people who have, I guess they're called critical illnesses, and people who work in hospice, and a lot of people who do Tibetan practice. And what we've come to do when we sit together is I hold his hand. and he likes the contact where he can feel almost nothing in his hand.

[31:59]

And we just chant in our heads. We started trying to chant aloud, but it takes too much strength even to whisper. So we chant in our heads together, and I keep time, and we just sit there silently. And sometimes we introduce the chant. And then, so we have a place to start and we just do that. I've learned a lot about patience and time for him. I've learned a lot about people's attitude toward life and death from other people who work with him. What he has is a form of multiple sclerosis, and he's had it for 20 years. And it's a form that goes into transmission.

[33:04]

Remission. Transmission. Hopefully into transmission. I'm good at mistakes. Remission. And he's been basically in a physical state he's been in for the last good 10 years. He may be there for another long time. The patience and the sense of time and the sense of age. He went to school with my son. They were great. He was a couple of years older. And in a way, he's lived so much longer than I have now. His sense of time must be very different. I'm giving you a signal there. I guess the other thing I've learned in the last month, two friends, very old friends, last week and a half, two friends who are very old friends have died.

[34:16]

And I've found that one really knocked me for a loop. And both of these people died very, suddenly one had just found out she had cancer and I had talked to her on the phone and we had made plans for me to come and see her and the very night before she died her daughter had called to say that the doctor had said she probably had a year to live and probably two months of those would be good and early that morning she died and All that morning I had been making plans about would it be better to go and see her now when we can laugh together and joke together or would it be better to go later when I might be of some help in a different way to her.

[35:16]

And I thought of David's work and maybe I could even learn something from him and study with him and have something that I could offer her in the more painful time. So it was such a shock to pick up the phone and her daughter calling me and not to arrange the best time for me to come and visit her, to plan, but to tell me that she had died that morning. And it told me a lot about, we think about staying in the moment and at the same time we say we do have to plan for our life And I realized that what I had done was not just started to plan, but I had fantasies about it, about how wonderful it would be to see Noah, how wonderful it would be to be in Chicago with her, where we first knew each other. And I had moved into a fantasy world, not just planning, but I moved into that, and suddenly it was just wiped out from under me.

[36:26]

And I learned a lot about that business of killing the present for the future in that moment. It's been a difficult month, but it's been a wonderful month. I'd like to open any questions or comments. Nice transitions. I find, David, that I come from the, you know, we have our half a grain of rice dish around here where you measure everything very carefully. And on the other end, I have the tradition of the good Jewish family where You know, everything has not, too much is not even enough. You have to, if you're making dinner, you have to keep cooking until the guest arrives.

[37:35]

And if you start two weeks early, you still keep cooking. So I managed at least only to touch an eighth of what the meal I had. you know, to receive this name from Suzuki Roshi. You know, desire to be named and then sometimes people want to name themselves. And a friend, the same one who had sat later with me, with Suzuki Roshi, had gotten the name and she was the only, her name,

[38:39]

She's the only person I knew who hated her name. And her name was Golden Needle. And it's, you know, it's the needle, the golden thread that stitches things together. She was an incredible seamstress. And she, you know, she had this rakasu that was like, you know, just unbelievable. And she helped other people with sewing. but she just hated, she was the only person that hated that name. I don't know, I was, I got a name then from Baker Roshi. I guess it was like having a, I mean it wasn't just the name, it was, you know, getting late transmission from him. I got a name from Baker Roshi and I always felt like he'd given me the wrong name. Deep Ocean Silence? And my close friend was Liz, who's now named Twomey, Liz Okamura.

[39:50]

And she lived right on the edge of the ocean. And at that point, at least, she was a rather quiet person who was always very fascinated by the sound of the ocean. And I sort of thought, you know, he mixed us up. People often mix us up. I'd gotten her name and she'd gotten mine. And then when I was head student, I said, Janelle, I would really like to take Chukai from you, because you've always been my teaching, and that's where my teaching comes from. And I said, that's a good idea. And then I thought he had forgotten all about it, because I never heard anything more, and no one asked me to sew a rakasu, and it was in the middle of sesshin. I guess people were going to take Jukai the last day of Sesshin, of this practice period. So I shrugged my shoulders and said, well, we'll forget it.

[40:51]

And then the day before it was over for Jukai, Mel said, you know, you're going to do Jukai tomorrow. And I said, I don't have a Raka still. And he said, Don't worry about it. So I didn't worry about that, but I went to bed. The last night of Sesshin, I was sleeping up in the apartment that Greg and Ross have now on the floor. And I thought, what is my greatest desire and my worst fear about getting a name? And I thought, big, fat, mutton slob. That would be really descriptive, but I don't want it. And then my other was, I would really dislike the word Zen in my name, but oh, they give the, you know, Zen Tatsu, that's only big shots that get the name Zen.

[41:56]

The next day, Jukai comes and oh, then I find out that the best, I can't keep secrets at all. I mean, I'm terrible. I mean, it really becomes gossip because it's so hard for me to keep secrets. That everyone, there were about 30 people who had been sewing a rakusu for me. And it's this rakusu. And when it was given to me, I was told, it looks like a drunkard sewed it. Because you can tell where everybody's stitches start and end. So everyone's visible mind shadow is here to see. Anyway, so it came. I'm sorry, I'm going on and on. And I have this wonderful rakusu, and you hold it on your head and all that. And then Mel starts telling you your name. Die.

[43:02]

Well, I don't know many words in Japanese, but die means great. And I thought, here it comes, great big mama. Anyway, I have a wonderful name, which also has something about time on it. It's from my favorite thing from the Shobogenza, which is uchi or being time and my name is Daishin Mitsu Zen which means Daishin can either be Buddha mind but it also means magnanimous mind and Mitsu means intimate or as of course the great cook Ed Brown told me it can also mean sweet and Zen means Zen. So I think I got the name Riano, the name that I wasn't old enough to get yet.

[44:05]

I mean, it seems it's like, well, it's entering Buddha's family. Right. Getting a symbolic recognition from Buddha or receiving a blessing from someone you love. Right, right. Greed for practice is an interesting greed. Peace on earth.

[44:33]

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