Falling Through the Ice. John D. Hiestand
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alcoholism would cost him his marriage, force him into early retirement and finally contribute to his death. But in the early sixties, Dad would just get ‘kinda weird’ every now and then. Emotionally distant by nature, he gradually widened the gap between himself and his wife and children, so that we kids could later say with some accuracy as adults, ‘I never knew my father.’ Sadly, Mom got to witness the transformation of this talented and intelligent man she loved and trusted into the emotional cul-de-sac we knew as children, with no idea how to stop it.
“As early as the mid-1950s, around the time of my birth, Mom must have had some sense that her trajectory through middle-class conventionality was not what she had dreamed of in life, including the growing recognition of a spiritual void. Raised a nominal Christian Scientist—something I discovered only much later in life—she had turned her back on this denomination in particular and religion in general at an early age. At first I think she accepted the notion that the materialism of middle-class living would fill her spiritual void. She perceived the church to be more of a social institution than anything else, which to her meant it didn’t really have any spiritual seriousness, a seriousness she craved more and more. When she finally realized that neither church nor materialism could fill this growing spiritual void, she had nowhere to turn in conventional society. Her artwork did provide her with some unspecific spiritual sustenance, and somewhere in the fifties she had discovered a Japanese art form called sumi-e which served to partially satisfy her bohemian soul and to fill the importunate spiritual void in her heart.
“Dad chose to fill his spiritual void with gin. Notwithstanding the numbing effects of alcohol, his pain was detectable even by someone as young as I was. Dad had been raised in a religion-less home and by a very domineering mother. Without even the habit of church instilled in him as a child, it never seemed to occur to him to seek God in any form or religion. I don’t really think he was an atheist; I think he was just very confused by anything spiritual, particularly when it tried to open up inner spiritual pathways that he had resolutely closed off. He accompanied my mother in some of the more intellectual avenues of exploring Zen Buddhism, but I don’t think his heart was really in it.
“Into this dysfunctional American dream stepped the most unlikely of all people: a Japanese Zen monk named Shunryu Suzuki. Suzuki-roshi had arrived in San Francisco in 1959 at the age of 55 in order to take over a Soto Zen temple, and to realize his lifelong dream of teaching Zen to westerners. At that time beatniks and intellectuals in San Francisco had a growing interest in Buddhism, which had sprung up out of San Francisco’s long and historic connection with the Orient, and popularized by local writers such as Alan Watts. The presence of a Zen monk in town caused quite a stir within this community. Suzuki-roshi gave a class on Buddhism at the American Academy on Asian Studies that was well attended. He began and ended the class by having the participants sit zazen for 20 minutes. He then invited participants to join him for morning zazen at his Sokoji temple, which they did in ever increasing numbers.
“At some point in 1964, Suzuki-roshi remarked that if a suitable meeting place could be found, he would be interested in starting a Zen meditation group down the peninsula. Eventually a meeting place was established in a home in Palo Alto, and the first meeting took place in November of 1964. Thursday mornings were chosen because they were convenient for the Stanford student who had organized the meetings. In 1965 the meetings were moved to a home in Los Altos, and it is there that my mother began sitting zazen every Thursday morning beginning at 5:45 a.m. For several years Suzuki-roshi led these sessions personally, as well as working tirelessly to establish the San Francisco Zen Center.”
Alan finally interrupted “Hold on. You were nine years, maybe ten years old. Were you really aware of all of these stories and histories?”
“No, not really. From my perspective Zen just sort of appeared in my family’s life. But later on my mom wrote down her experiences and how she got started with the Zen community .1 In 1965 she was at a party with some friends and one of them told her there was a Zen Master teaching the practice of zazen in Palo Alto one morning a week. Mom had become interested in the subject of Zen through her interest in sumi-e. And for a few years she had been attending an annual weekend seminar with Alan Watts on the subject of eastern thought and Zen practice, hosted by friends of ours at their home in Los Altos Hills. But Zen was only an intellectual pursuit up until then, which was kind of ironic considering that Zen is primarily about practice, not thought or belief. She was terrified of actually doing it, but a few months later she learned that the zazen group had moved to Los Altos, less than a mile from where we lived, and she began to run out of excuses. Finally in September of 1965 she showed up at the little homemade zendo at 5:45 on a Thursday morning for her first session of zazen. She met Suzuki-roshi in the foyer before the session began and they nodded politely at each other. After he went in, she removed her shoes and followed him in, and she later wrote these words: ‘The minute I stepped into the room, I knew I had come home.’”
I had to stop for a moment, catching my breath as I remembered Mom’s love of that little zendo and her adoration for Suzuki-roshi. Alan, unsure of what the silence meant, squirmed for a moment, then said, “Powerful stuff?”
“Yeah. Mom’s family history was full of heartbreaking brokenness, and in 1965 she was becoming aware that her own family was not an episode of Ozzie and Harriet. So finding a place that told her heart that she belonged was, yeah, powerful stuff indeed. And yes, she had trouble sitting properly, and never could achieve a full Lotus position, but these were not really hindrances for her in contemplative practice. On that first morning, after sitting a little uncomfortably, the session ended with Suzuki-roshi giving a brief talk, then the small group gathered for a light breakfast. Mom found herself sitting next to Suzuki-roshi and was completely tongue-tied. Suzuki-roshi was, as usual, completely at ease, and began telling her that he had come to America in order to buy a plot of land: a plot of land for his grave! Mom was shocked, Suzuki-roshi was amused, and as far as I can tell they got along perfectly from then on.
“My mother’s recounting of her first encounter with zazen was typical of the physical difficulties unpracticed Americans had with sitting zazen, and Suzuki-roshi was always willing to accommodate the student. The purpose of zazen was to cultivate a calm mind to assist in the seeking of enlightenment, not to perform an empty, contortionist ritual.
“As I said, Mom had attended some seminars at a home in Los Altos Hills that belonged to some friends of ours, Win and Helen Wagener. Win and Helen were like an aunt and uncle to us Hiestand kids, and they owned an expansive and architecturally unique home in Los Altos Hills, which they had custom built. The home had been specifically designed to comfortably host private seminars on topics that interested them, and it was here that I have my first memory of Suzuki-roshi. If a physical description of Roshi interests you there are plenty of pictures of him you can find online, but I would not be able to describe him based on my memory alone. What was striking to me as a 9 year old child was his presence. His appearance was highly exotic with his shaved head, oriental features and long robes, but even at a distance you could sense a great depth and calmness within him. His countenance was always friendly, and he paid attention to everything that he did. Unlike most adults, he never condescended to children. When encountering him you got the sense that his spiritual vision was extremely clear. His gaze was not intense like a laser beam, but rather all-encompassing like a large, warm and comfortable quilt. In a way that we would now call typical of a Zen master, he could be extremely practical without any particular concern for outcomes. While I have no doubt that I may have idealized these childhood memories to some extent, I cannot say that I ever saw him fall outside of this Zen calm, or lose the humorous twinkle in his eye. He would draw all eyes in a room towards him not because of his stature (which was diminutive) nor his cleverness (he was always straightforward, and often witty), but because of his presence. He had a habit of dropping unexpected words of wisdom that made you stop and think more deeply about whatever it was you were doing. These were often in the form of a koan, which is a puzzle that has no logical answer and is used to expand the mind, but at least in Suzuki-roshi’s case these koans were usually followed by a laugh and a twinkle in his eye.
“In 1966, Suzuki-roshi expressed an interest in having a typical American meal, so Mom invited him to our home for dinner. Suzuki-roshi had