Good morning, Sangha. Welcome to our Monday morning speakers program. Today, I'm happy to introduce Sue Osher. Sue is a longtime student. She's been with us at the Berkeley Zen Center since 1990. She was born and raised in Berkeley, and she's lived in her house in Oakland for almost 50 years. She was ordained by Sojin Roshi in 1995. She has two grown children and a granddaughter in Oregon, and she had a Montessori preschool in her home for 13 years until she closed it in the year 2000. She has been our Orioki teacher for quite a long time, which she misses very much during the pandemic. Welcome, Sue. This is being recorded.

[01:01]

Thank you. I wanted to send it to my son, and I'm a little blank on who else. And I wrote out six pages, and we'll see how far I get. So I don't think I've given away Seeking Mind talk since 2016. and I see the tendency to turn it into a share and tell, which is my preschool background, and so forgive that. I also just want to say last week David Gill gave his talk, and I want to say hi, David. I live in Montclair, and I think some of my kids might know you. It was Lisa Hoffman. and at the time she was in school in Montclair, so you might have known her.

[02:03]

Anyway, my granddaughter also graduated from the California College of Arts in May. I've been digging around in Gordon's library, and the term that's come up lately has been, I feel marked, I feel marked by history, my personal history, my family's history, and I never paid much attention to it, but the stuff in that library, and there's lots left, I'm trying to thin it out, I keep finding treasures, and I want to I want to share some of that. But first, I want to just mention I've been marked by or imprinted by some things, and I want to just say that during last Thursday's Dokusan with Sojin, he and I spoke about the Rakasus

[03:25]

and the layered knee robes. And the phrase on my robe that I sewed in 1995 was, take the backward step into the circle where light issues forth. And Ross kindly sent me a little background on it from Master Hongzhi. And that circle... is a touchstone or has marked me, and occasionally I can access it. So that's been great. Let me just see if I can get a view of more than mine. There we go. And I think that center, to continue that conversation, relates to so many things, including that still point that sometimes we access in Zazen, sometimes in yoga, sometimes in exercise, sometimes in nature, sometimes where there's beauty.

[04:30]

And I also felt struck or a sense of imprinting with what Jerry talked about in the Sashin last Saturday. And she spoke of Dogen's vow to save all, to become Buddhas, to save all beings, the Ehe Koso Hotsu Ganmon, we chanted that first, and she left us with the question, what is your inmost desire? And usually, I would say, It's just to be comfortable and at ease and free from pain. And sometimes it's the four vows, you know, to be of benefit to all life.

[05:34]

And then I asked my granddaughter about it last night when we had our Sunday chat, and she said her inmost desire is to travel. And I realized that sometimes it's chocolate. So it's, you know, I don't think there's a right answer on that, but it's a good question. I want to go back to, and let's see, Karen, maybe you can stop me in time for questions at the end. How about I stop you at 20 after? Okay, because, yeah. It'll just have to be whatever I get through, I get through. But I do want to hear from people. And I can probably hear from people by email, right, if you want to talk later. So my life has been marked or defined since the 1980s by Gordon, my husband.

[06:40]

He died last year. It's been a hell of a year, people, for all of us. He died October 10, 2019. And last November, and I don't, let me check the participant list. My stepson, Tom Ogier, might be on this call, and I want to say hi to him. And my daughter, Lisa Spencer, is on the call, and that's great. Yeah, he hasn't joined us, but that's okay. So we had a memorial for Gordon last November 4th, and Tom came out from Bethesda, Maryland, and took a couple hundred pounds of photos and papers and books from Gordon's library, which I appreciate, and made a little dent. But this incredible Osher energy has been balanced by my Zen practice.

[07:47]

You know, it's like I had to do both to survive. He was a tough, abrasive, funny, bright guy. And he was my teacher in many ways. I think he really got a lot of the Zen practice, though he wasn't a student. And I'll tell you a couple Gordon's stories. And I apologize for repeating them, but my family likes repeated stories, especially the ones we know the punchline to. And I never remember other people's stories because I don't pay attention that much, but here goes. The day after... our first anniversary, I rolled over in bed and gasped, and Gordon said, what's wrong? And I said, I forgot. Yesterday was our first anniversary.

[08:49]

And he said, shame on you. And we both just cracked up. This was a man who was not sentimental. And I finally figured out after the four years we'd been dating before we got married that Taking him shopping for wedding rings was a no-go. And so I bought them. Here's mine, and here's Gordon's. And that was good, and he wore it for all the years we were married. So what else do I want to cover? Yeah, some other treasures I found. I mean, in past talks, Leslie reminded me that I passed out little garnet rocks from the road in the Adirondacks that leads up to the Osier Cabin.

[09:49]

And I still have some. The roads were graveled with garnet mine tailings, so you could find little pieces of garnet pretty easily back there. And I just love that. I think one year I passed out Doug Fir Cones, which was from Mount Tamalpais, because Gordon and I hiked there as much as possible. And I share and tell, and I guess you guys are invited to come up and take treasures from the library because I can't give them to you today. But I found these bird prints. I showed them to Hannah on a walk we had on Friday. I think Friday. So see if this shows up. This is one of them. From a bird artist called Alan Brooks.

[10:51]

And I think my father-in-law, Gordon's dad, who worked at the Smithsonian and the National Geographic, probably knew him. He was a scientific editor. So these are, there's, you know, like, I don't know, 20 of them here. And they're, I know that his work is sold on eBay, but I don't know the story of these prints. The other thing I found was that just, you know, hit me. I know I've been digging through, having a different sense of... the lives of my in-laws. Grace was an artist, and Paul was a scientific editor, poet, and writer. And they lived near Washington, D.C. And any Osier family has lots of Grace's artwork and prints.

[11:53]

She was a printmaker. Anyway, this is a drawing she did, and I don't know if it'll come out. in 1940, and this was during World War II, and somehow I was surprised, I can't even comprehend this, and then Paul did the poem on the inside, it was a Christmas card, and they sent out the Christmas cards with Paul's poetry or writing and Grace's drawing on the front every year, and there's a, collection that Gordon organized of it, and I'm sort of finding more of these, but the grief that they had during World War II, I connect with it. This time we live in is so tragic and painful, and that has been around forever, the grief and the

[12:56]

war and the violence, and we're really seeing that now. But they lived with it, and to think that this is a Christmas card is mind-boggling. I'll just read the first paragraph. The Peacemakers, Christmas 1940. And now their voice is silenced by the roar, their snow-white banner bloody. torn and furled. The gentle bird lies dying at their door, turning its eye against an angry world. So that was the earliest Christmas card I found. And I just want to show you things got a lot lighter over the years. This is from 1951, and this is Grace's Woodblock, and the poetry is, I'll just read the first verse from 1951.

[14:10]

The good that we have saved in spite of all our woe, guard well its ancient house, lest it escape. and go. And it occurred to me, just very deeply in the last day or two, that Grace and Paul, in the 50s, that's when they bought the property in the Adirondacks in upstate New York. It was an old, a bunkhouse and became a hunting club up on the slope of 11th Mountain on the edge of the Siamese Pond Wilderness. And I have told many stories about being back there, and eventually when I closed the preschool, Gordon and I spent months there. And the aim, as I've said many times, is...

[15:18]

for those who've heard my talks, that to go back after the peak of the black fly and mosquito season and before the pipes freeze. So that was really, you know, a certain time you could be, I would be there. My stepson, Gordon's son, is going, he spends a lot of time, it's his refuge too. But Grace and Paul, this was, a refuge in a sanctuary, and I think a lot of people come here to Berkley's Den Center to find refuge, and we do, and I'm grateful for that. During this time, in the last year, I see this place as a refuge in a different way of the house I live in. And... And I would say a refuge that needs maintenance a lot.

[16:19]

So what else? I see my daughter, Lisa Spencer, on the call. I'm going to say hi. I don't see her face, but hi, Lisa. And thanks for joining. Let's see. I sort of hit the high spots here. Just want to, something else struck me this week, and I'll take a couple minutes on that. I wish I'd invited my sister to join the call. I totally forgot, but it's being recorded, so I'm going to see if she wants it. I was born in Berkeley in 1943. And my sister was born in 1947. And our parents' dad was a machinist. He had a crankshaft grinding shop in Emeryville called East Bay Grinding Service.

[17:27]

And eventually it became Jerry's Crankshafts when he sold it and went back to work for the guy who bought it because he couldn't play golf. He realized seven days a week that was enough. And mom was a homemaker. and they moved from Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania. And I'm very grateful I was born and raised in Berkeley because even though my parents didn't have, weren't a cultured, educated class, I was exposed to such families, my friends' families. And I got to see what people who had libraries and books and intelligent conversation were like, and I really, I think that was another mark of bonding and imprinting, if you will. I'm very grateful that my family had a great sense of humor, and it was something that is really important to me.

[18:32]

Gordon's family, who were raised on farms in the East, in different parts of the East, craved education, and they worked their butts off to get it, and It was like being part of a salon, you know, to go visit them. And they were very welcoming to me. So I appreciate that. And I got to experience and appreciate really, really, really bright intellectual people. So that was an imprinting experience. So my daughter is a career counselor, and my granddaughter works in a company called Icicle Tricycle. She's the office manager and website designer. And my son and his wife live in Newburgh, Oregon, and Jill works for a company called Biosense Webster.

[19:38]

Nobody has to remember this. I wouldn't. And Cindy's a former acupuncturist, and they've been working on remodeling their house and garden, and it's pretty amazing work. So I'm done. I give up. Thank you. Thank you so much, Sue. Such a rich life. We have time for questions. So if you're unfamiliar with Zoom and you have a question or a response, please go down to the participants box and click on it and then you will see a little button that says raise hand and I will call on you when I see your raised hand. You can also put a question in the chat box and I will read it. So the first question I see Ellen Webb, would you like to unmute yourself, please, and ask a question?

[20:41]

Hi, Sue. It's so great to see you. I've really missed seeing you over these past months. I hear about you from other people, but I haven't seen you. I know you've probably told people this a million times, but I would love to hear how you came to the Berkeley Zen Center, because I don't know that. It's a series of... Lucky accidents, I think. My stepson, Tom, loaned me Sue Moon's book called Tofu Roshi, and I laughed so hard I fell off the couch. I don't have the same appreciation for the humor at this time, but it was sort of the Ann Landers advice column for Buddhists. And then somebody told me about... Zen meditation orientation at Green Gulch. And I and a friend went over there and I thought, you know, if I'm going to be over here, I'd rather be hiking on Mount Tam.

[21:48]

I wonder if there's anything in Berkeley. So I looked up in the phone book and there was the Berkeley Zen Center in 1990. Walked in the gate and it felt very much at home. And I realized that... that the book, Sue Moon's book, was based on the Berkeley Center. So some people read Suzuki Roshi's books. I read Tofu Roshi. That's how I got here. Thank you, Sue. Okay. Stephanie Solar, would you unmute yourself, please? Hi, Sue. Hi. Thank you so much for your talk. It was very heartfelt. and quite moving for me. I was wondering, Sue, as you experience being marked and imprinted by Gordon, how that imprinting has affected you emotionally over the years, what you've noticed.

[22:50]

He toughened me up. We respected each other, and that was sort of a... And he was a very... He couldn't be manipulated. He told the truth. Yeah, it was like somebody I just admired very much and learned to have to stand on my own two feet and took very many courses and... got therapy help, and finally dragged him into a couples counseling, and we did a couple of other things where we just, there was nothing held back, and we got down to this still place, the center of the circle where the light issues were, where we just were, and there wasn't any trying. And then I think we mellowed over the years, too, thank God, because I wouldn't have survived.

[23:53]

Tell me your question. I'm not sure I answered it. I think you did. Thank you. Rondi, would you like to unmute yourself, please? It's Charlie. Go ahead. Okay. Can you hear me, Karen? Yes. Oh, good. Sue, what is the correspondence between... teaching Montessori and teaching Orioki. It's a precise correspondence. I guess that's one of the things that appealed to me about coming into saying you had rules, you had a procedure, it was precise. I may not do it right, ever, but I had a path. So Montessori promotes focus.

[24:57]

That's one of the big things, attention. And I guess I'm pretty scattered. And that was really helpful for me. And to set up an environment, which I think is like an altar, to create our environment so we're settled. Here we are. And the children would come in. This was in my home. It was a small morning program. And we could explore and discover. And I think that, I think I've told this decision. It's like the Zen Center is sort of like a preschool where we all can discover our place. Well, thanks very much, Sue. Yes, we all have our own seats in the Zendo. Those are our places. Thank you. Jake or Leslie? Oh, hi, Sue.

[25:58]

Great to see you. I enjoyed your talk. You know, with imprinting experiences, I resonated to that a lot. And for me, sometimes I actually know I'm in an imprinting experience, and sometimes I don't know it until many years later. Do you think that's true with some of yours? Yeah, I do. I think that that's what this year has been about, this time of physical distancing. And there's time. I have time to look at that. Yeah, it's true. But sometimes you meet someone or you're in a situation, and I had that when I walked in the gate. in 1990, which is, oh, home. You know, maybe not the home that I actually grew up in, but a sense of place and safety.

[27:03]

And, you know, some people don't have that experience, but I think that maybe we look for that on all our years and find it practice in our Zen practice, finding it where we are. Yeah. Thank you. Yeah. I think we have time for one quick final question. Mary Duryea, would you like to unmute yourself please? Thank you. Good morning, Sue. It's so nice to see you. I wonder if you want to say something about Gordon's library because it's not the usual library and I feel privileged to have been taken in to see it. but it was quite an experience. Well, what I'd like to do is invite everybody to come and see it who wants to. We have an external entrance.

[28:04]

It was originally built by Gordon through a wall in my daughter's bedroom closet, which became Gordon's office, and it was a way to get out in case of a fire, and it goes under the garage, and it's a dirt floor, and you get to see what one man can do with a bunch of two-by-fours and plywood. And it's probably, there were 5,000, I would guess, books in there and papers and documents, and I think he was a hoarder. And a lot of, so there's a dent in me, but there's treasures I'm still finding. And it's really fun to share them, and I just take great joy in people finding things they can take away. Yeah, thank you. Is there anything else you want to say? What did he inherit, some of it, from a father or grandfather who worked at the Smithsonian? It's his father's library and his mother's library. So there were art books, and I just found some cassette tapes that are oral history taken of his father during his time at the Smithsonian.

[29:15]

I'll send it back to Tommy. He'll have to clear out space for it now. Thank you.

[29:24]

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