Susan Phillips:  

Education: After high school with you all, I went to College of Marin & Sonoma State University for the first two years of college. At COM, I started a service club called the Altruists which helped with the start-up of the Marin Institute on Alcoholism. We, for example, put on a jazz concert with Cal Tjader, Dizzy Gillespie, and Oscar Peterson. I just called up the managers of all these famous people on the telephone and got them to volunteer to be in the concert. Cal Tjader called me back personally. I was so innocent then, I didn't know to be intimidated. Then I put myself through the rest of college and graduate school in Sociology at UC Berkeley while working part-time. I earned an MA in Sociology, specializing in Social Psychology. I was headed toward a Ph.D., and even passed my qualifying exams. I felt, however, that I didn't have anything important to add to the world of academics and dropped it. Family LIfe: I met my now ex-husband in graduate school, we did everything together for 27 years. No children. He is a fascinating guy, but the emotional climate in our relationship was not right for a long time. I was too much of a roller coaster. I like being calm & quiet. Consequently, I divorced him in 2001. Around that time, I also moved back to San Rafael to my old family home to take care of my mother in her last years, and my sister who had cancer at the time. We all took care of one another at that time. And, I have been living in my old family home with my sister (who is fine now, thanks), my dogs, and some foreign students ever since. These folks and my friends are my family now. Travel, Politics, Religion: I took one year off of college and hitch-hiked around Europe for 6 months, then traveled with a friend there for another 6 months by car. I became radicalized by what I saw in Europe (such as police attacking peaceful protestors in Paris) and became active in the anti-war and the women's movements when I came back to America. I explored a lot of religions in my thirties and forties, mostly in a semi-anthropological way. This was an extension of what my friends and I did in the Tri-Hi-Y Club (a YWCA Club) did during our high school years (exploring various religions). I practiced Buddhism for about 4 years and became the co-director of a Zen Center in Berkeley. I practiced meditation religiously, so to speak, on my own for another 6 years. I was told at the time that things would start getting weird after 10 years of consistent strong meditation, one would I was told, start seeing the cause & effects of everything throughout your life. And, that did happen.. Later, I traveled to India with a group and a Hindu/eclectic Sadhu (think mystic or monk) and participated in a large several-day gathering of Hindus and Islamic leaders during a time of great tension between them. I learned a tremendous amount from those explorations, but do not consider myself religious. Creative stuff: The things I am most proud of are reading poetry in the Yerba Buena Park on poetry days, doing some stand-up comedy, and acting at the Magic Theater. Work: I worked for many years as a research assistant at UC Berkeley, UCSF Medical Center and UC Fresno. Gave some papers at the American Sociological Association meetings around the countr...Expand for more