Therese Fitzgerald came to the SF Zen Center in 1976, was ordained as a priest by Richard Baker in 1986, with her husband Arnold Kotler founded the Community of Mindful Living applying the teachings of Thich Nhat Hahn who ordained her as a dharmacharya in 1994. She worked with Maxine Hong Kingston's Veterans Writing Group. Now Therese is a hospice chaplain in Maui where she and Arnie moved to long ago. There's more to her story you can hear about in this podcast and then next week's part two.

Ted Tripp heard Shunryu Suzuki speak at Stanford in 1967 and met him the next year at Tassajara where Suzuki let him stay longer in order for him to prepare himself to go to prison for anti-war activities. He's recently retired from teaching English at San Jose State and UC Santa Cruz.  He  says, "A solid foundation of dharma and ability to practice meditation is a good preparation for what comes next."

Rico Provasoli came to the SF Zen Center in 1967 to visit his brother Paul Provasoli who'd been there already several years. Rico got a taste of Zen training and set out on a long path that took him to many teachers and places. He's written two books: Please Don't Tell My Guru and Golf Between the Ears. His website is ricoprovasoli.me. For the last couple of decades he's been a student of Cheri Huber. 

Jeff Sherman came to the San Francisco Zen Center in 1968. He practiced with Shunryu Suzuki, Richard Baker, and Katharine Thanas. Now he's with Josho Pat Phelan at the Chapel Hill Zen Center.  This is the 2nd podcast with Jeff and focuses on  his role in preparing Shunryu Suzuki's  ashes site. There's a brief memory of Suzuki and a cool ghost story as well.

Charlie Pokorny is now a teacher at the Brooklyn Zen Center, He and his wife Sarah were  head teachers  at the Stone Creek Zen in  Sebastopol, CA, for 8 years. He was at  the SFZC, mainly Tassajara and Green Gulch farm for12 years during which time he and Timothy O'Conner Fraser got Shunryu Suzuki lecture audio and transcripts up on the SFZC website. He teaches at the Inst. of Buddhist Studies in Berkeley - and he's done a lot more but you can get  at least some of that from the podcast.

Michael Papas came to the San Francisco Zen Center in 1980 at the age of 25 ready to kill himself if Zen didn't work. Thus begins his  way-seeking mind story.

Follow Mark Foote's unique way-seeking mind story and thought. Delve into it at zenmudra.com and  at Zazen Notes on Facebook.

This is part 2 of the podcast with Eric Larsen who came to the SFZC in 1970. Aside from his Zen studies, he apprenticed with master sculptor, blacksmith, etc Alex Weygers, and learned chain saw sculpting etc from JB Blunk, and studied with Yurok shaman Harry Roberts. In recent years he's been immersed in Butoh dance in Japan and the US. See ericlarsendance.com. More at Eric's cuke.com page.

Eric Larsen came to the SFZC in 1970. Aside from his Zen studies, he apprenticed with master sculptor, blacksmith, etc Alex Weygers, and learned chain saw sculpting etc from JB Blunk, and studied with Yurok shaman Harry Roberts. In recent years he's been immersed in Butoh dance in Japan and the US. See ericlarsendance.com. More at Eric's cuke.com page. This is part one. Next week part two.

Robert Shuman was a student of Shunryu Suzuki in the San Francisco and at Tassajara  and then a student of Joshu Sasaki in LA and at Mt. Baldy and then of Philip Kapleau in Rochester.  He and his wife Hennie went to Raleigh to lead a Zen group long ago and they're still there now though their group hasn't met since Covid began.