June

6-27-11 - The phrase “most important” as found in Shunryu Suzuki lectures. 229 instances. 85 each of "most important point" and "most important thing." Read #1

And they continue on almost daily for months.

6-20-11 - MEMORIES OF SUZUKI Roshi FROM WIND BELL AND DC FILES - #45 - Stephen Wiltse

This was the last of 45 entries put on cuke one by one from 5-07-11 - (when the entry read) Beginning a new group - Memories of Shunryu Suzuki from Wind Bell and DC Files - from letters written to Richard Baker, Zen Center, the Wind Bell, collected by DC in the late nineties while doing research for Crooked Cucumber. Includes letters written to DC.

Jerry's Ray's memories of Shunryu Suzuki

6-19-11 - MEMORIES OF SUZUKI Roshi FROM WIND BELL AND DC FILES - #44 - Gerald Wheeler

6-18-11 - MEMORIES OF SUZUKI Roshi FROM WIND BELL AND DC FILES - #43 - Mel Weitsman

long time abbot of the Berkeley Zen Center

Interview with Mel Weitsman

6-17-11 - MEMORIES OF SUZUKI Roshi FROM WIND BELL AND DC FILES - #42 - Edward Van Tassel

6-16-11 - MEMORIES OF SUZUKI Roshi FROM WIND BELL AND DC FILES - #41 - Fran Tribe

6-15-11 - MEMORIES OF SUZUKI Roshi FROM WIND BELL AND DC FILES - #40 - Teah Strozer

Teah Strozer link page

6-14-11 - MEMORIES OF SUZUKI Roshi FROM WIND BELL AND DC FILES - #39 - Steve Stroud

6-13-11 - MEMORIES OF SUZUKI Roshi FROM WIND BELL AND DC FILES - #38 - Erik Storlie

Eric Storlie link page

6-12-11 - MEMORIES OF SUZUKI Roshi FROM WIND BELL AND DC FILES - #37 - Bishop Ippo Shaku

6-11-11 - MEMORIES OF SUZUKI Roshi FROM WIND BELL AND DC FILES - #35 and #36- Jane Schneider and Peter Schneider

Peter and Jane Schneider are teaching at the Beginner's Mind Zen Center in Northridge, Los Angeles.

Jane and Peter Schneider link page

Click on thumbnail to enlarge photo

6-10-11 - MEMORIES OF SUZUKI Roshi FROM WIND BELL AND DC FILES - #34 - Jill Schireson

6-09-11 - MEMORIES OF SUZUKI Roshi FROM WIND BELL AND DC FILES - #33 - Elizabeth Sawyer

Reverend Elizabeth Sawyer - Interfaith Minister- Lay Ordained Buddhist

The Wonderful Discovery of Elizabeth Sawyer

Charles Grob is doing some interesting and compassionate research and treatment with psilocybin and terminal cancer patients. Here's an interview with him on Wisconsin Public Radio. Here's more on Charles Grob.

6-08-11 - MEMORIES OF SUZUKI Roshi FROM WIND BELL AND DC FILES - #32 - Ed Sattizahn

Ed Sattizahn has been chairman of the board of the SFZC for several years and has been an important supporter of work to preserve the legacy of Shunryu Suzuki. See SSHP.

6-07-11 - MEMORIES OF SUZUKI Roshi FROM WIND BELL AND DC FILES - #31 - Sue Satermo

Sue Satermo link page

Another video by Bill Scheffel with Jakusho Bill Kwong talking about on becoming a teacher

Jakusho Bill Kwong link page

Bill Scheffel's video site which might have more on Kwong - there are three from him posted on Kwong's link page.

Scheffel's web site - Western Mt.

6-06-11 - MEMORIES OF SUZUKI Roshi FROM WIND BELL AND DC FILES - #30 - Lew Richmond

Lew Richmond link page

John Steiner sent this frog in memory of Suzuki Roshi who was fond of frogs and mentioned them now and then in lectures. Just located 41 instances of him using that word.

Photo sent by and maybe taken by Tim Jones in or near Austin, Texas, and labeled, "nocturnal images from a small pond just outside the house in Hays County."

6-05-11 - MEMORIES OF SUZUKI Roshi FROM WIND BELL AND DC FILES - #29 - Paul Reps with a brief comment from DC.

6-03-11 - Albert Saijo passed away yesterday (thanks John Tarrant for forwarding the news from Kevin Diminyatz on the Big Island in Hawaii). Saijo was a lesser known character in the Beat scene and was around Sokoji (the original home of the SFZC) some in the early days, lived in the nearby East-West House and then the Hyphen House. He's mentioned in passing herein in interviews with Philip Whalen, Joanne Kyger, and Ananda Claude Dalenberg. He wrote a book called The Backpacker and co-authored a book of Haiku with Jack Kerouac and Lew Welch called Trip Trap.

Tarrant included this poem, Bodhisattva Vows by Saijo and wrote, "He was in the internment camp during World War II at Heart Mountain in Wyoming where Nyogen Senzaki had the only zendo in the US at that time. Albert's mother was a haiku poet and his brother, Gompers, was an artist, some of whose calligraphy paper I still have."

Here's a good article on Saijo with photos - from the Tinfish Editor's Blog.

MEMORIES OF SUZUKI Roshi FROM WIND BELL AND DC FILES - #28 - Jerry Ray

6-02-11 - MEMORIES OF SUZUKI Roshi FROM WIND BELL AND DC FILES - #27 - Yvonne Rand

Yvonne Rand link page

6-01-11 - MEMORIES OF SUZUKI Roshi FROM WIND BELL AND DC FILES - #26 - Larry Prager

May

5-31-11 - MEMORIES OF SUZUKI Roshi FROM WIND BELL AND DC FILES - #25 - Rowena Pattee (Kryder)

Creative Harmonics (her website)

Interview with Rowena

5-30-11 - MEMORIES OF SUZUKI Roshi FROM WIND BELL AND DC FILES - #24 - Willard McCarty

5-29-11 - MEMORIES OF SUZUKI Roshi FROM WIND BELL AND DC FILES - #23 - Molly Jones MacGregor

5-28-11 - MEMORIES OF SUZUKI Roshi FROM WIND BELL AND DC FILES - #22 - Alan Marlow

5-27-11 - MEMORIES OF SUZUKI Roshi FROM WIND BELL AND DC FILES - #21 - Alan Klein

5-26-11 - MEMORIES OF SUZUKI Roshi FROM WIND BELL AND DC FILES - #20 - Taiji Kiyokawa

5-25-11 - MEMORIES OF SUZUKI Roshi FROM WIND BELL AND DC FILES - #19 - Richard King

5-24-11 - MEMORIES OF SUZUKI Roshi FROM WIND BELL AND DC FILES - #18 - Durand Kiefer

5-23-11 - MEMORIES OF SUZUKI Roshi FROM WIND BELL AND DC FILES - #17 - Irene Horowitz

5-22-11 - MEMORIES OF SUZUKI Roshi FROM WIND BELL AND DC FILES - #16 - Pat Herreshoff

5-21-11 - MEMORIES OF SUZUKI Roshi FROM WIND BELL AND DC FILES - #15 - Edmond Gordillo. This is my personal favorite. - dc

5-20-11 - MEMORIES OF SUZUKI Roshi FROM WIND BELL AND DC FILES - #14 - Eva Goldschied

5-19-11 - MEMORIES OF SUZUKI Roshi FROM WIND BELL AND DC FILES - #13 - Della Goertz

Della Goertz link page

5-18-11 - MEMORIES OF SUZUKI Roshi FROM WIND BELL AND DC FILES - #12 - Charles A. Gilman

5-17-11 - MEMORIES OF SUZUKI Roshi FROM WIND BELL AND DC FILES - #11 - Stephanie Flagg

5-16-11 - MEMORIES OF SUZUKI Roshi FROM WIND BELL AND DC FILES - #10 - Mike Dixon

Mike Dixon link page

5-15-11 - MEMORIES OF SUZUKI Roshi FROM WIND BELL AND DC FILES - #9 - Kent B. Davis

5-14-11 - MEMORIES OF SUZUKI Roshi FROM WIND BELL AND DC FILES - #8 - Ananda Dalenberg

Ananda Claude Dalenberg link page

5-13-11 - MEMORIES OF SUZUKI Roshi FROM WIND BELL AND DC FILES - #7 - David Chadwick

David Chadwick links page

5-12-11 - MEMORIES OF SUZUKI Roshi FROM WIND BELL AND DC FILES - #6 - Tim Buckley

Tim Buckley link page

5-11-11 - MEMORIES OF SUZUKI Roshi FROM WIND BELL AND DC FILES - #5 - Edward Brown

Did Shunryu Suzuki use koans?

5-10-11 - MEMORIES OF SUZUKI Roshi FROM WIND BELL AND DC FILES - #4 -  Peter Bailey

(not this Wind Bell which is chosen at random)

5-09-11 - MEMORIES OF SUZUKI Roshi FROM WIND BELL AND DC FILES - #3 - Art Atkinson

5-08-11 - MEMORIES OF SUZUKI Roshi FROM WIND BELL AND DC FILES - #2 -  Frank Anderton

5-07-11 - Beginning a new group - Memories of Shunryu Suzuki from Wind Bell and DC Files - from letters written to Richard Baker, Zen Center, the Wind Bell, collected by DC in the late nineties while doing research for Crooked Cucumber. Includes letters written to DC.

The first letter - Mark Abrams

5-05-11 - Suzuki disciples tell stories Jan. '98 part XI and the last in this series.

There's a fantastic new documentary out about Chogyam Trungpa, Crazy Wisdom. We got to see an early screening of it this weekend and it is really wonderful. They have a short section in there about Trungpa and Suzuki Roshi,

[Filed this in Suzuki Film among other places] - Joe Galewsky

5-05-11 - Suzuki disciples tell stories Jan. '98 part X

5-04-11 - Suzuki disciples tell stories Jan. '98 part IX

Dairyu Michael Wenger cuke link page to his Zen teaching, his art, his books, his stewardship of the Suzuki archive work.

5-03-11 - Suzuki disciples tell stories Jan. '98 part VIII

Some Shunryu Suzuki lecture audio in the archive were fixed.

67-12-01A and 67-12-02

67-12-04 and/or 6712-04A was just renamed as 67-12-02.

The file named 67-12-02 had the second half of 67-12-01A and something else. It was just a mistake. My bad because I listened to the beginning of every tape to compare with the first line of the transcript. I guess that was one I planned to get back to to figure out and then forgot about. But now it's fixed.

The fixed files are in their rightful place on shunryusuzuki.com and also in shunryusuzuki.com/new/replacements.htm

Only 16k mp3s - the 32k mp3s are too big to load from here in India, at least where I go to upload.

And for taking so long to get to this, my apologies to Charlie Pokorney of Suzuki Roshi dot SFZC dot org where all the Suzuki lectures are going up one by one in a better presentation than on shunryusuzuki.com. - dc

5-02-11 - Suzuki disciples tell stories Jan. '98 part VII

5-01-11 - Suzuki disciples tell stories Jan. '98 part VI

Eric Arnow has his own web site now. For years I've been putting his letters from Asia here. From now on they'll go on his site, the Bumble Buddhist which also now has all the previous ones from cuke and photos more. - dc

Eric Arnow link page

April

4-30-11 - Suzuki disciples tell stories Jan. '98 part V - if you notice that the last one you read was part III and wonder where part IV went, part I was just divided into parts I and II so IV became V. - dc

Special thanks to Robert Barner and Keith Cowan for helping to keep this going. See something I wrote on this today. And yes Robert I'll find that Tim Buckley interview first thing when I get back. - dc

4-29-11 - Suzuki disciples tell stories Jan. '98 part IV

4-28-11 - Suzuki disciples tell stories Jan. '98 part III

Jakusho Kwong link page including a link to

Jakusho Kwong in Crooked Cucumber

A brief memory of Shunryu Suzuki by Brit Pyland which came in the form of a gentle correction to something in DC's first notes on Suzuki posted 4-26.

4-27-11 - Suzuki disciples tell stories Jan. '98

part I   and   part II

Who were the Suzuki disciples

An old note on the Japanese for Crooked Cucumber and the meaning - with help from Hoitsu Suzuki and Gary Snyder. - something that came up in the disciples' discussion.

4-26-11 - DC on Shunryu Suzuki - 1st thoughts.

Prior link in the new DC on Shunryu Suzuki and So Forth

DC Link Page

I think it makes sense to do this. At least it adds to the catacomb effect. - dc

4-25-11 - Katherine Thanas remembers a talk by Reb Anderson.

Reb Anderson link page

Just stumbled across this not yet released book: Dogen's Genjo Koan: Three Commentaries by Eihei Dogen, Nishiari Bokusan, Shohaku Okamura and Shunryu Suzuki (Aug 1, 2011) Published by Counterpoint.

Books by and about Shunryu Suzuki

4-24-11 - TASSAJARA AND SUZUKI IN THE TIME OF THE SANDOKAI TALKS, in the summer of 1970

in which this introductory sentence caught my eye: The Buckeye Fire burned 44,000 acres and got to Willow Creek just over the Tony Trail. After looking into that a little further, added it to the History of Fire at or near Tassajara.

Brief discussion with a few Suzuki disciples about the time of the Sandokai talks, the summer of 1970, the first addition to

Groups of stories or Groups telling stories

Branching Streams Flow in the Darkness

Shunryu Suzuki's lectures on the Sandokai

4-23-11 - Interview with Robert Aitken

Here's an interesting bio on Hakuun Yasutani, Aitken's first teacher,  which includes a brief bit on Aitken, Maezumi, and Eido. Don't know where it came from. Just found it in my files. - dc

4-22-11 - Interview with Tom Wright

4-21-11 - A Brief Memory of Shunryu Suzuki by Tony Johansen.

Brief Interview with Toshiaki Nakahara, friend of Otohiro Suzuki

Edward Brown sends a spring note

Edward's Peaceful Sea Sangha

Edward's cuke and other links page

4-20-11 - Interview with Tim Ford

Photo of Kobun Chino on Facebook. Testing linking to it.

4-19-11 - Interview with Sterling Bunnell

4-18-11 - Memories of Suzuki Roshi by Rene Pittet

4-17-11 - Interview with RD

4-16-11 - Interview with Steve Tipton

cuke and other link page for Steve Tipton

4-15-11 - Interview with Paul Disco

and a link page for Paul

4-14-11 - Interview with Louise Pryor (formerly Welch)

4-12-11 - Interview with Loly Rosset

4-11-11 - Brief Interview with Tim Aston

4-10-11 - Tiny Interview with Teah Strozer

4-09-11 - Interview with Peg Anderson and Will Stocker, early Suzuki students from Palo Alto, Peg was born in 1903 and her path took her to some seminal spiritual teachers of the forties and fifties on the West Coast. Will, born in 1916, was in charge of building the Haiku Zendo in Los Altos.

4-08-11 - Adding some odds and ends to what's on cuke about Les Kaye, abbot of Kannondo including

notes of a couple of chats with him and some comments.

That's found at the bottom of the Les Kaye Interview page (interviews by others mainly).

Mary Kaye on Suzuki the thief - in brief memories,

Kaye, Les. Zen at Work: a Zen Teacher's 30-Year Journey in Corporate America. Crown, 1996.
[Les has been a priest at the Los Altos Zendo since Suzuki ordained him in 1971 and for many years he combined his priest practice there with his job at IBM.]
Amazon link

4-07-11 - Interview with Lucy (Bennett) Calhoun

Ashland Farm - Lucy and Clay's home and biz

4-06-11 - Interview with Dr. Albert J. Stunkard, one of America's senior Zen students and teachers, doctor to DT Suzuki who studied with several great teachers including Shunryu Suzuki.

4-05-11 - A couple of follow-ups filed in Readers' Comments

In answer to Ann Brown's question of two days ago, Here's the SFZC's service and ceremony audio page. - thanks Brit Pyland who also sent this self portrait or maybe hands portrait.

4-04-11 - Photos from and of Bob Halpern

click thumbnail to enlarge

4-03-11 - Interview with Ken Sawyer of Sawyer Construction.

Ann Brown of the Kumeido, the Little River Zen Center in Mendocino asks:

Hey, I was wondering if you have a recommendation for a site that has audio recordings of our Soto Zen Chants...in particular Daihishin Dharani and the Heart Sutra.

I pointed Ann toward Elsie Mitchell's incomparable Way of Eiheiji. I also said I am sure that some groups have such recordings.

Any other suggestions? I don't have time to Google right now. If so please let us know at dchad@cuke.com.  Thanks. - dc

Here's the SFZC's service and ceremony audio page. - thanks Brit Pyland

4-02-11 - Interview with Norm Randolph

Peter Levitt writes: On Sunday I based my talk on some notes from a talk Suzuki Roshi gave on Sept 14, 1969. In this talk he says, "Yesterday [visitor] Yasunari Kobata was speaking about something about Japanese literature.' I am assuming he means Yasunari Kawabata, the great novelist who is the only Japanese novelist to receive the nobel prize in literature. Kawabata is my favourite Japanese author, and I think same for Kaz [Tanahashi], so I am very interested in this reference. Do you have any information (or memory) of the visit to which he refers? Are there any records indicating that Kawabata came to see SR, or that he gave a talk around mid september 1969. If so, I would love to know about it.

DC says: I don't know anything about this. Do you? If so please write me at <dchad@cuke.com. Thanks.

4-01-11 - Brief interview with Pat Herreshoff

March

3-31-11 - Is That So? by Laura Burges on Tim Buckley: Zen Way, Yurok Way
on the SFZC website. In it she mentions his book

Standing Ground: Yurok Indian Spirituality, 1850–1990 by Thomas Buckley (UC Press page for the book)

Here's a note from Tim about the book put on cuke in Dec. '09

Tim's Wikipedia page

Damn - can't find the interview I did with him. I'm sure I have it back in Santa Rosa. But I did find this story of Tim with Suzuki Roshi in his Garden from an old letter he sent Baker Roshi when they were collecting Suzuki stories for the Wind Bell back in the seventies. Filed in Brief Memories. - dc

[Got Tim's interview transcribed after returning from India - see Tim Buckley link page.

Interview with Katherine Thanas of the Santa Cruz Zen Center

When in Alaska, be sure to stop at the Achorage Zen Community for an enlightening sit. Just got an email from their Director Shogen Danielson and realized they weren't in the Dharma groups in or related to Shunryu Suzuki's lineage section of the links folder. But now they are. Congratulations.

3-30-11 - Interview with Ken Berman

3-29-11 - Brief Memories of Suzuki by Joanne Bull

Interview with Jim Morton which is also pretty brief but not right for Brief Memories.

3-28-11 - Interview with Anne and Jim Armstrong who were around the ZC back in the Suzuki days and later. Anne is a psychic who many students saw and this interview concludes with her psychic reading of Shunryu Suzuki from their home in San Anselmo in 2002..

3-27-11 - Interview with Jonathan Altman, artist, a founder of Lama Foundation, student of Zen with Shunryu Suzuki and later of Tibetan Buddhism.

3-24-11 - Interview with Henry Shafer, early Suzuki and Trungpa student, SF Cable Car employee.

3-23-11 - A long interview from 1994 with Gary Sndyer by Matt J (Jenske?) who was living at Green Gulch back then from which his brief memories of Shunryu Suzuki have been snatched. And since there is more from Gary on cuke, there's now a Gary Snyder Main Page.

3-22-11 - Interview with Ted (Ed) Tripp, draft resister, peace marcher, memories of Shunryu Suzuki.

3-21-11 - Edward Brown on his shaking and Suzuki

3-18-11 - An interview with Deborah Madison and Pat McFarlin from 1963 at their home in Santa Fe, separated into two pages and files.

3-17-11 - Interview with Rick Morton whose wife Caroline's interview was put on cuke 3-13. Today we include their wedding photo - married at Tassajara by Suzuki Roshi July 14, 1970 (Bastille Day).

Buddhism and Wealth: Defining 'Right Livelihood' - Lew Richmond's Huff Post blog featured on their front page today. My web news habit is to quickly on all - check the BBC RSS feed first, then Huff Post, Talking Points Memo, and Crooks and Liars. So I was most pleased to see Lew's article featured so prominently on Huff today.

See Lew's cuke interview where there are more links.

3-14-11 - Interview with Don Deangelo (Crockin)

3-13-11 - Interview with Caroline Morton - Only 69 files to go in the folder of interviews, notes, and transcripts this interview came from. Then there are 26 audio files of notes I'd read aloud and recorded before leaving. After that I can cull through the folders and files in my digital labyrinth seeking other undigested matter to share in cyberspace until the last bit degrades.

3-12-11 - Interview with Craig Boyan (the beloved), student of Shunryu Suzuki, devotee of Meher Baba.

Check out the great photo of Daya Goldschlag and Darlene Cohen near the top of Daya's interview

3-10-11 - Elizabeth Tuomi Memorial Page.

A brief interview with the late great Rick Fields who wrote How the Swans Came to the Lake about  Buddhism coming to the West - with other links. Also some about the early Hindu influence and Theosophy as per the above post.

3-07-11 - Some Brief Memories of Shunryu Suzuki from the cuke archive backlog which is what I'm working on these days here in Tamil Nadu. - dc

Pat Phelan - the early wake up bell story, one of the most told.

Kobun Chino - a few comments

Ken Schnell - How do I express my gratitude?

Elizabeth Tuomi - his eyes

3-05-11 - Les Kaye, abbot of the Los Altos Zendo and disciple of Shunryu Suzuki sends a question which DC answers.

Les Kaye on cuke and elsewhere

3-03-11 - Added some notes to the Interviews with Hoitsu Suzuki, Shunryu's son. 
Also added this link to Hoitsu Suzuki at City Center from Natural Wisdom blog
and a bio from Sweeping Zen
and this SFZC brief bit on Hoitsu.
And a good photo of Hoitsu on Flickr
And Valleys and Mts. - download a lecture by Hoitsu

And there's more on the web.

Check him out at Hoitsu main page

added more info to Lewis Richmond entry below

3-02-11 - Remembering a Man of Wisdom by Lewis Richmond, an article about Shunryu Suzuki published in 1996 in Interbeing Magazine.

Lew's website, Living and Aging as a Spiritual Practice

For more on Lew Richmond, go to his cuke interview page

Lew is now blogging on the Huffington Post. He'll be posting there every couple of weeks. To see my first post, take a look here:

Huffington Post blog: worry less, care more

He is also present on facebook at Lewis' Facebook Page and twittering at @lewrichmond

3-01-11 - Some brief memories of Shunryu Suzuki from Barbara Young

Grahame H. Petchey sent the following excerpt from a letter he wrote. Tacking it on to his cuke interview.

February

2-28-11 - Interview with Judyth Weaver

Her website - Judyth O. Weaver, PhD

2-27-11 - Interview with John Steiner, indefatigable peace worker both outer and inner, key actor in the best remembered incident of Suzuki era oral history, and for that event, the Suzuki Explosive Answer page.

2-25-11 - Created a Nona Ransom Main Page - she was Shunryu Suzuki's English teacher during his college years.

Dealing with the Details of this Archive

Looking for more references to Nona Ransom, I remembered that Brian Power (RIP) had told me over the phone from England in the mid nineties that she was a teacher of his in Tientsin in China in the 30s or so. As I recall he said she was rather strict. He had a photo of her I think in his book on the last emperor of China, Puyi. In looking for that book in the bibliography on this site I couldn't find it so I went to a file of Crooked Cucumber itself and it was in the bibliography there along with another book that had somehow slipped out of the bibliography when it was included here. So now they're both here on cuke in the main and original bibliographies. Only took twelve years to correct that error.

Power, Brian. The Puppet Emperor. Universe Books, 1988.

Uchiyama, Kosho. The Zen Teaching of "Homeless" Kodo, Kyoto Soto Zen Center, 1990. [I'm considering scanning this book to put in here because it's often so hard to get].

Read more on this plus pithy reflections in dchad misc

2-24-2011 - Harry Ransom-Rose on Nona Ransom, Shunryu Suzuki's English teacher in his college years. This is newly entered on cuke, adding to:

Nona Ransom in Crooked Cucumber

Shunryu Suzuki on Nona Ransom

See The Twelve Days of England  - written in 2000 after I met Harry Rose

2-23-11 - From Loring Palmer's 2011 note to DC after reading his interview posted here three days ago - now appended to the interview with the following put in his Brief Memories of Suzuki:

Also, I didn't talk about the deep impression that Suzuki Roshi made on me by his authentic presence: sincerity and integrity. He was a package of beauty, truth, and goodness: Buddha, Dharma, Sangha. His speech, movements, and decorum were magnetizing: lightness-of-being. The ordinary as extraordinary. I "turned Japanese" after being around him---from the outside in. Remember the haramaki [waist sweater] and devotion to the zori? We're the luckiest people in the world to have met SR and the wabi/sabi aesthetics of Nippon: enjoyed practicing Cha-no-Yu for 10 years while in Boulder. Life is good!

2-22-11 - Shunryu Suzuki had a radiation belt.

2-21-11 - Barbara Bash with a brief memory of Shunryu Suzuki. Check out Barbara's website and visual blog.

2-20-11 - Interview with Loring Palmer -  Suzuki, Trungpa, Andrew student, and cuke contributor from 1994. Took me a while to get to it. That's one thing I'm working on now here in Tamil Nadu, getting more interviews and notes up on cuke, going through the considerable backlog. - dc

Loring Palmer on Suzuki and did he take LSD?

Brief memories of Suzuki from Loring's interview

2-19-11 - Zen and Chinese medicine and Shunryu Suzuki - no I don't know anything about it but came up with an interesting memory via Loring Palmer and a suggestion for the questioner. Read on in Brief Memories of Shunryu Suzuki.

2-18-11 - This site was created in December of 1998 as a supplement to the book, Crooked Cucumber: the Life and Zen Teaching of Shunryu Suzuki. There was a lot of the info as presented still in the Crooked Cucumber section, and some photos. Now and then I'd make a change or add something such as in the schedule of events or errata pages. In May of 1999 I started adding to it on a more regular basis and started this What's New page which grew to a What's New section. Every year I have to create a page for the prior year and add links for it to the What's New pages for each year going back to 1999. Just did that. Got a problem with the margins not holding so need to find what's causing that. Always busy work like this and I can only spend so much time on maintenance. But it's interesting when I open the old files to look back at what was posted in these years. - DC

2-18-11 - Here's a New Year's card sent from Mitsu Suzuki, Mrs. Suzuki, Okusan, Shunryu Suzuki's widow, to Daya Goldschlag. Tozen Akiyama Roshi kindly translated it as 

2-16-11 - Lani just called to tell me Michael Gilmore passed Jan.30th at 10:30 PM. By all accounts a very good passing. Svaha! - an email from Jack Elias.

Michael has been having serious liver trouble for years. Clay and I visited him and Lani in March, staying in their Palm Desert condo, and we talked till late. I'd received word he was dying and had a phone conversation with him before leaving for India in which he said he was fine, maybe a week before he died. I should have known because it was hard to get through to him. Farewell Michael - I'll miss our long conversations and your Tarot readings. Must get some of his art up on cuke.

Read Michael Gilmore's cuke interview. It's quite interesting. - dc

2-15-11 - Patrick Woodworth sends his brief memories of Shunryu Suzuki.

2-14-11 -  Suzuki and Katagiri student Eric Storlie on dharma transmission in an article entitled Lineage Delusions in Sweeping Zen dot com. Eric Storlie link page

2-09-11 - Early Sokoji chant card

Got an email from John Eberly that, among other comments, stated :

In Crooked Cucumber, you wrote how Allen Ginsberg asked SS for permission to use his translation of the Heart Sutra. Can you point me to a link for this version online or somewhere?

The way I find things on my own site is often just to use Google. So I wrote "cuke.com heart sutra" in Google and come up with this link on top. Note that there are two versions of the old Sokoji chant card, the early four page or two sides of two pages and the later two sides of one page. Enjoy. - dc

1-21-11 - Lou Harman died yesterday.

Joan Amarol wrote on 1-20 - lou died at 3:42 this afternoon. blanche was right there with him. he was surrounded by his family, with sangha members sitting close by. at his request we immediately performed a precept renewal ceremony. his body will remain at zen hospice until sunday. sitting times are 9am-9pm. you can also check the zen center facebook page for updates.

at 7:30 tonight we'll hold a ceremony in the buddha hall at city center with sojun mel weitsman officiating. we'll recite the heart sutra and daihi shin dharani to help lou on his way. tomorrow morning's service will also be dedicated to lou.

cuke interview with Lou and Blanch

1-13-11 - Jerome Petersen's Funeral - Life Celebration: Saturday, February 5, 3 pm

Jerome's cuke page

1-12-11 - Darlene Cohen, Su Rei Ken Po, Great Spirit Manifesting Dharma, died at 1:15 AM this morning.