I had been emailing back and forth with longtime GT contributor Liza Monroy about when I was going to run her cover story on the local Surfing Moms group, and she had suggested perhaps tying it in to Mother’s Day, which lands on May 8 this year. Then she emailed me that she had just picked up last week’s issue, “and then the first line of your weekly letter is about generally not tying issues to holidays,” she wrote. “I was like whoops!”
But actually I’m like whoops, because with a little schedule shuffling, we were able to make her piece the cover story this week, and she was 100% right to suggest it. Her story is a fantastic way to celebrate moms—first, it’s got the offbeat angle of specifically looking at moms who surf, and second, it’s even more about the challenges of motherhood—especially early motherhood—than it is about surfing. Or perhaps more accurately, it uses the intersection of those two subjects to highlight the importance of both, and how they can be taken for granted. In a way, her story asks, “Why don’t we think of motherhood as a community activity, in the same way we think of surfing?” I think that’s a great thing to think about as we honor moms everywhere.
And I, for my part, will remember in the future what social media should have taught all of us long ago: never try to definitively state what you do or don’t do, because you’ll be proven wrong immediately after.
In GT’s 4/13 article about redistricting, it was incorrectly stated that the National Demographics Corporation (NDC) authored one of the district maps that was thrown out by the Ohio State Supreme Court. While NDC was brought in to work on a map, it was not adopted by the Ohio Redistricting Commission. We regret the error.
PHOTO CONTEST WINNER
YOU CAN GROW YOUR OWN WAY Landmark oak at Twin Lakes. Photograph by Dianna Glidden.
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GOOD IDEA
PAGES FOR THE PEOPLE
UCSC’s Deep Read, the annual program that brings students, faculty and readers across the world together to discuss a recent book, is officially underway. This year, participants will read Transcendent Kingdom, the acclaimed novel from Brooklyn-based author Yaa Gyasi. The book covers issues like first-generation assimilation, opioid addiction and mental health. Deep Read participants can join online and in-person discussions of Transcendent Kingdom via regular weekly emails, online forums and more, all culminating in a live discussion with Gyasi. Learn more at thi.ucsc.edu/deepread.
GOOD WORK
TELLING OUR STORY
As GT wrote about earlier this year, music photographer Michèle Benson has been working on a documentary about the history of the Santa Cruz music scene. She has interviewed more than 200 people, from band managers to club owners to musicians, across every era of Santa Cruz music. Now her documentary All Access; Music in the Cruz is in its editing stage, set to release this fall, and Benson is seeking funding to complete it. Donate at gofundme.com/f/all-access-film-music-in-the-cruz-1960s-2020s.
It was the best of conditions, it was the worst of conditions, it was the age of cooperation, it was the age of tantrums, it was the epoch of swell, is was the epoch of flatness, it was the season of sun, it was the season of fog, it was the spring of crowds, it was the winter of spaciousness.
With apologies to Dickens, so might go the opening lines of a novel based on Surfing Moms of Santa Cruz.
Once a week, in all conditions—barring extreme weather—a group of moms and children of various ages and surfing levels gather in a spot marked by a flag depicting the image of a woman carrying a surfboard in one hand, a baby perched on the opposite hip. Around the meetup site are beach blankets, a first-aid kit, sand toys, child-sized wetsuits, an array of boards, snacks and an ever-expanding group of mothers, fathers, grandparents and other caregivers who partake in surf-and-childcare trades. Babies, toddlers and children play in the sand and hang out with half of the adults at the meetup, while the other half goes surfing. Whether two people show up or 20, the structure holds.
While notoriously incompatible, surfing and motherhood are similar pursuits: you never know what any given day will bring, and must be prepared for ever-changing conditions. Sometimes it’s seamless, a reminder of why you ever did this in the first place. And other days leave you cringing, hoping for a redemptive moment that will make the sacrifices worth it. One must remain vigilant and try to avoid getting held down. In the unpredictability of it all, what Surfing Moms members can know for sure is that they will get in the water, and their kids will be cared for by others in the same situation.
Board Moms
The Surfing Moms concept is not new—lauded local documentary The Super-Stoked Surf Mamas of Pleasure Point (no relation to Surfing Moms) tells the story of a group of local surfing friends who experienced pregnancy together and surf-swapped for childcare well into their children’s toddler years. They were never a formalized group, just friends helping one another out. When I spoke with Katie Loggins, an ultra-stylish surfer who was an original member of that crew, she’d mentioned that their group would sometimes get requests from people visiting town or other moms who surf, inquiring about how to join up for childcare. But that didn’t exist, at least not in any formalized way. Their group was friends helping friends during a very particular juncture in their lives. Since their kids had grown, and were surfing themselves, they didn’t need it anymore. So goes the cycle of life, parenthood and nature.
Moms steal some time in the waves at a Surfing Moms meet-up. PHOTO: TARMO HANNULA
Still, demand remained. When you have a baby or a toddler, surfing is an inconvenient hobby at best—and a guilt-inducing addiction at worst. Sometimes both on the same day. Surfing isn’t like the gym, with an adjacent childcare center. Nor is it like a hike, where you can strap a kid on your back, or a quick run where you can be done within an hour. Surfing in Santa Cruz requires preparation: the wetsuit-ing process, getting to the break, paddling to the lineup and waiting your turn, catching waves, failing at catching waves, wiping out, getting that epic ride, wanting to do it all over again.
For newer moms, add on guilt pangs that come along with leaving your little one for your own surf-seek, especially if you got there and it was blown out or so crowded you didn’t surf. I remember a particular day when my husband stayed with our kids, which he very often does to support my surfing—a fortunate example that should just be a normal one. I went to my favorite Eastside break only to find high winds and eyefuls of saltwater, plus small and meager waves. I was more bummed out that I had left my kids for this than by the poor conditions themselves. Thankfully, this was saved by an evening glass-off and two long, guilt-relieving rides before returning to spearhead dinner-bath-bedtime routine.
Give a Mom a Break
Dr. Elizabeth Maden, mother of three and the founder and president of the nonprofit Surfing Moms organization, is an Assistant Professor of marine biology in Hawaii whose work focuses on ocean health. Surfing since her twenties in Hawaii, California and Australia, she’d been looking for a way to get back into surfing after having her first two kids when, during her time in Australia, she came upon the Surfing Mums group that has dozens of chapters around the country. Upon moving to Hawaii, she wanted to keep it going, and started Surfing Moms in 2018.
The group Surfing Moms started in Austraila, and inspired the American offshoot Surfing Moms, which has eight chapters in California alone—including the more recent Santa Cruz group. PHOTO: TARMO HANNULA
“Being part of Surfing Mums in Australia,” she writes via email, “the group I joined before moving to Hawaii, and now Surfing Moms here in the U.S. has been such a game-changer for me personally, so it gives me incredible joy to see so many others now getting to experience it as well.”
Surfing Moms now has over 200 members, with eight chapters in California, four in Hawaii and one in New Jersey. If an area doesn’t have a group, anyone can start one.
Digital Media and Sponsorship Officer, Candace Stalder, who works in digital media at USC, is often asked “why I’m involved if I don’t have any kids,” she says. “It’s simple. Seeing the difference it made in someone I care about, to see what the community held for her, was incredible.” Stalder is referring to co-founder Anna Shoemaker, who recently stepped down from an organizing role where she established partnerships, brought in sponsors and handled publicity for the group, leading to further expansion.
“Anna gave me massive shoes to fill,” Stalder says. “She was doing such an incredible job getting us involved in local events, surf shops and more in all the areas of our nine [at the time] chapters. She also was the one who got us on local news stations, in newspapers, and she got us on the Today Show. She has put in so much work to help us reach as many moms as possible. Words don’t even begin to describe the dedication and time spent. She has made my path a little easier and less daunting.”
Members Only
Despite the media attention, I hadn’t heard of the group until a new surfer-mom friend—history teacher, personal trainer and mother of two Sara Wright—told me she was considering starting a chapter in Santa Cruz.
Wright asked if I would join, but on learning that caregiver-parents pay $52 a year for membership, I initially felt skeptical, despite it being far from an exorbitant fee. It was the principle: shouldn’t we be able to meet in public space and trade off surfing sessions and childcare for free on our own? Why did we need a formal organization to do what sounds so simple on the surface? “Why don’t we just watch each other’s kids and surf for free?” I asked her. “Like they did in Super-Stoked Surf Mamas?”
What I’d forgotten is that organizing surfers is like herding cats. Organizing mothers, who are managing mental and emotional loads and unpaid labor already as household CEOs, schedule-keepers, full- or part- time job-holders, kid-Uber, etc, adds more difficulty to the equation. When we had actually attempted to make plans, Wright reminded me, they’d fall through for one reason or another: a child was uncooperative; someone had a cold; the surf forecast looked less than stellar and we bailed; we were tired; we didn’t have enough support or consistency to really make it reliably happen.
Even with every resource at one’s disposal—such as being fortunate enough to have several world-class surf zones within 15 minutes or less—surf-swapping as a parent of young children is a complicated combination to do informally with friends. Every moving piece—nap times, swell, daycare schedules, extracurricular commitments—must align. To join Surfing Moms, all you need to do is click a “Become a Surfing Mom” tab on the website, sign up, then show up at a meet.
Surfing Moms member and Treasurer, Lainy Condon of Hawaii, explains that the annual subscription fees “help to pay for public liability and accident insurance, maintaining our 501c3 non-profit status, promotional materials to help us reach more Surfing Moms, the website, group first-aid kits, CPR and first-aid training for our Group Coordinators and our annual gift pack.” Along with maintaining what the groups need to function, they also donate 5% of every subscription to nonprofits “focused on ocean and/or maternal health.” In 2021, the Surfing Moms organization donated to the Surf Conservation Partnership, an organization within Conservation International focused on protecting areas with outstanding waves and biologically diverse marine and coastal ecosystems.
History teacher, personal trainer and mother of two Sara Wright founded the Santa Cruz chapter of Surfing Moms. PHOTO: KAILI REYNOLDS
“We are 100% volunteer-run, so every cent of subscription fees goes back into the organization,” Condon says.
So I got on board (yeah, sorry). It’s like committing to a gym or a club—because I just signed up, I’m going to show up.
“Buying into it is de facto for the society we live in,” says longtime surfer and recent member Andrea Riordan at a morning meetup. “We buy into things and it helps put a stamp on it: ‘This actually means something to me. It represents energy that I’m going to commit to it.’”
Buying into it is what got me there, but then the experience of Surfing Moms is what keeps me coming back. As Wright says, “As moms we often put our needs last. It’s nice to have this thing to look forward to that’s so inclusive. The slogan, ‘A Surfing Mom is a happy mom’ is so true. You leave feeling refreshed. It benefits both mother and child. You get to surf, they get to play. There are connections, new friends, this little tribe of moms and kids. It came together organically, and all are welcomed.”
Board Meeting
At the first meet-up I attended, my initial skepticism was erased faster than my memory of labor pain. Surfing Moms was, in short, kind of magical. It brought together people who had probably previously shared a lineup, but never met, and made friends out of strangers. The community is growing as more parents learn of its existence and what it provides. As member Amy Schwerdtfeger explains, “I have friends who I surf with who aren’t moms, and I have friends who are moms but do not surf. This group is the only one I have that is the blend of moms who also surf … or, surfers who also mom?”
Alexa Thornstrong has been surfing since she was 9 years old—about 22 years now. She kept surfing until she was 32 weeks pregnant, and got back in the water as soon as she could postpartum.
“Four weeks,” she says, “though I think you were supposed to wait six. I couldn’t do that. But getting back in the water after birth was very difficult. Surfing isn’t like any other sport where you can get a babysitter and go at any time of day. Surfing is a very weather-reliant, condition-reliant sport. Having a set time every week with others who are trying to get in the water made it that much easier and motivating.”
As a mom, she says, “I think it’s important to stay yourself. The inspiration of filling my heart with all the goodness that comes with surfing fills those around me when I come in.” It was also the first time she left her young child with “someone other than dad or grandma. Seeing them happy on the beach with like-minded people and the impact of community is huge for me.”
Surfing Moms is about surfing, yes, but it’s more than the 50-minute session you get at a meetup. It’s an exercise in emerging from an isolating pandemic, building community and rediscovering ourselves anew.
“The amount of surrender it takes to redefine who you are as a surfer after you have children is a journey,” Riordan says.
Surfing Moms typically meets in Capitola, but this morning we opted for a small-to-medium wave day at Steamer Lane.
Jerilyn Sambrooke Losch, a tech product manager and mom of two, has driven down from Pacifica, toddler and baby in tow. Sambrooke Losch appreciates Surfing Moms because “there’s always a reason not to go surfing: conditions aren’t good, the schedule doesn’t work … to have a group that commits to a time every week and makes conditions secondary is critical to really surf.”
Even so, conditions are secondary to community.
“If you get in the water it’s a bonus,” she says. “You lower your expectations. Everybody makes that bargain with themselves before they show up. It’s refreshing.”
Music therapist Jody Priestley-Wilfong started surfing six months ago following a family tragedy. “I made a bucket list of things I wanted to do, because you’re never guaranteed another day,” she says. Surfing was one of them. She flew her best friend out from Michigan to take a lesson in Santa Cruz, was hooked, bought a board and got a coach. She loved it, but was also homeschooling her son, so wanted to find a meetup like this. “I Googled ‘moms and kids surfing,’” she says, “and Surfing Moms came up.”
Coincidentally, Priestley-Wilfong also became qualified as a surf therapist with the group started by clinical psychologist and Vice President and Founding Board Member of Surfing Moms, Dr. Amelia Borofsky.
Borofsky is stoked on Surfing Moms, lamenting how early moms groups she attended were more focused on the babies, while moms sat around discussing sleep schedules and toilet training.
“I couldn’t just sit and talk!” she says by phone from Oahu. (“OMG me too” went my inner narrative during our conversation.) “I Googled surfing moms. I’m a single mom, I wasn’t going to go surfing without support. Lo and behold, Liz had started a meetup three months earlier a block from my house. The main point for me, as a mom of daughters, is for them to see me taking care of myself, not just taking care of them. They learn to be strong, fun, adventurous women by modeling. It’s so powerful for our girls to see us doing this.” Her advice for moms: “Don’t lose your wild.”
Across the Pacific Ocean, back at Steamer Lane Supply, the Surfing Moms of Santa Cruz echo Borofsky’s sentiments. Our kids are “intrinsically learning to respect mothers taking time to do something they enjoy,” Riordan says. Sambrooke Losch tells her sons, “‘Tomorrow is mom’s surf day. Mom needs to take care of herself and that’s what this looks like.’ Women need to do that to show their children and other people, ‘This is what it looks like for a mom to enjoy her body after having a baby.’ It’s a big deal.”
“Yeah, like, ‘I can still do it,’” Riordan says, as everyone laughs in agreement.
Swell Predictions
Surfing Moms has taken off “in a way that I think none of us expected,” Madin writes. “It’s grown so much bigger and faster than what I could have ever imagined when I started our little local group a few years ago. I am beyond thrilled, and so stoked that we’re now able to help other moms build their own surf-care communities, just like we did!”
Madin hopes to see groups continue to form around the country, ultimately getting to the point where every coastal community in the U.S. has a group that parents and caregivers can join. “Then it’d be so cool to see the model be adapted for other sports and things: Kitesurfing Moms, Swimming Moms, Tennis Moms, Painting Moms…you name it! It can work for just about any activity.”
As for the local group, six months after starting it, Wright notes how fast it is growing and developing. “I didn’t know you, but you’ve been living here this whole time,” she tells me. “It was easy to connect—we have those two shared identities. Moms understand other moms and how important it is for us to get in the water.”
As my kids get older, I don’t see us outgrowing Surfing Moms. The possibilities are endless: we could end up teaching our kids to surf through Surfing Moms—it’s a dream of mine to surf with my daughters—or perhaps travel to visit different groups or surf swap with Southern California, Hawaii and East Coast member families.
Having a new community of mom-friends who are surfers—and friends for my children—because of Surfing Moms, coming out of Covid, is something so valuable it’s hard for even a writer to put into words. Parenthood, especially primary parenthood, can be overwhelming and isolating. The ocean connects us, heals and provides a totally different kind of social life than a landlocked version of meeting for meals and at playgrounds.
Even on the rare meetup that doesn’t go as smoothly, such as a singular Friday afternoon when there was the dreaded combination of no waves and a crowded lineup, along with little ones ashore going teary, being in a group of like-minded caregiver-surfers means someone is always there, someone who is going through it all right there with you.
Adds member Priestley-Wilfong, “Just having a place where you can come and I can bring my child, and knowing he’ll be taken care of so I can nourish myself, that I can go out and not worry, brings peace and nourishment to my soul. I need it as my mom. This organization is a godsend to me and my mental health.”
Come hell or high tide—or toddler meltdowns—we’re in it together. And that is the best part of our first chapter.
For more information about Surfing Moms, go to surfingmoms.org.
With hearts the size of a small car and arteries wide enough to swim through, blue whales are the largest animals in history. They’re also one of the noisiest. Some of their booming vocalizations, louder than jet planes, travel for hundreds of miles in the water.
Scientists use this noise to observe these marine giants and their ocean ecosystems. In two recent studies, researchers combined acoustic recordings from Monterey Bay with environmental and behavioral data to learn more about the decisions blue whales make while hunting and migrating.
“Sound travels incredibly well in water,” says Monterey Bay Aquarium Research Institute (MBARI) biological oceanographer John Ryan. “This species and others have evolved for millions of years longer than we have to use sound.”
MBARI, based in Moss Landing, has recorded underwater sounds through a deep-sea microphone—called a hydrophone—since 2015.
The hydrophone sits 3,000 feet deep on the ocean floor just outside of Monterey Bay. Anyone can tune in to the live audio through the MBARI Soundscape Listening Room, but many of the frequencies it records are too high or low for humans to hear.
Scientists—and sometimes machine learning algorithms—pick apart these recordings and isolate whale calls.
“Acoustics is a really powerful tool for studying marine mammals in general and particularly these large baleen whales like blue whales,” says Dawn Barlow, who finished her Ph.D. studying blue whale ecology at Oregon State University this month. “They are vocally active, so they produce a lot of calls. They’re low frequencies, so we can pick them up from long distances. And we can monitor them over long time periods and broad spatial scales non-invasively and without needing to get out on the water.”
Barlow was not involved in the Monterey Bay work, but uses similar methods to study blue whales in New Zealand.
The Monterey Bay studies combine sound with other types of observations like tags that suction onto the whales and remote sensing of ocean conditions.
“What’s unique about these studies is their combination with behavior,” says Barlow. “They also bring in information learned from the movement of the whales via tags. So we have the ability to listen over these long distances as well as the behavioral and environmental context of those calls.”
Both of the studies demonstrate flexibility in the behavior of blue whales—something that likely helps them survive in the ever-changing ocean environment.
Giant Gatherings
David Cade was studying the maneuverability of blue whales in 2017 when he and colleagues found huge gatherings around Monterey Bay. They saw up to 40 whales within a square kilometer—an extremely rare sight.
Cade, a former postdoctoral researcher at UCSC who now works at Stanford’s Hopkins Marine Station, began piecing together an explanation.
Alongside Ryan and collaborators, he studied whale behavior and calls, the movement of krill—tiny shrimp-like crustaceans that make up almost all of a blue whale’s diet—and oceanic conditions like currents.
“The wind comes down from the south, and then that creates a lot of upwelling, and then that creates a lot of nutrients, and then that creates a lot of plankton, and then that creates a lot of krill, and that creates a lot of whales,” Cade says. “But what’s not well understood is exactly why and when that happens. Some years in Monterey Bay, there are really high abundances of whales, and some years there are not.”
The whale supergroups that Cade saw in 2017 were feeding on enormous patches of krill. The buffet was so large that they appeared to be calling other whales to it.
“The number of krill in these patches is so big, it would have taken these 40 blue whales several days to deplete that much krill,” says Cade.
And ocean conditions change quickly, so currents or other environmental factors would likely disperse the patch before the whales could finish it.
In such cases, “it might actually be beneficial for blue whales to share the location of these resources,” Cade explains.
The whales’ behavior seemed to confirm it. The number of foraging calls increased when they found these large swarms of food.
The behavior might have to do with kin selection—an evolutionary strategy that involves helping relatives with shared genes survive even at a potential cost to the individual.
Whaling decimated the blue whale population, so “even if it’s not your brother or your cousin, everyone’s pretty closely related,” says William Oestreich, an incoming postdoctoral researcher at MBARI who contributed to the study. “And so there’s a lot of benefit at the population level to helping one another find these really short-lived but really high-quality patches of food.”
Timing it Right
Oestreich also recently used acoustic recordings of blue whales in Monterey Bay to study a different aspect of their behavior. In a recent paper, he and Ryan describe how the animals decide when to stop foraging and migrate south for the winter.
They worked with Jeremy Goldbogen’s group at Stanford University and other collaborators from around Monterey Bay to deploy bio-logging tags.
“They’re devices that have sensors like you have in your cell phone that can measure the movements of these whales underwater and also capture the vibrations produced by their calls to give us a sense of what sorts of behaviors they’re undertaking when they’re singing at different times of the day,” says Oestreich.
The team found that although the whales typically arrive at their southern destination around the same time every year, they vary their departure time by as much as four months.
When the blue whales decide to leave depends on the foraging conditions around them. In years with more abundant krill and better hunting opportunities, the whales stick around longer. They likely also use calls from other blue whales to make their decisions about when to leave.
“To me, one of the most surprising things was that they were able to match the timing of that migration flexibly with an ocean process that’s occurring over enormous spatial scales—much larger than any one individual should be able to sense,” says Oestreich.
Scientists consider blue whales to be fairly solitary. But the way sound travels in the ocean might make it possible for them to behave collectively “over spatial scales that we can’t really always wrap our heads around as terrestrial mammals,” says Oestreich.
Diving Deeper
Almost every time researchers tag whales or dive into recordings, they learn something unexpected.
“There’s just so much new information out there,” says Cade. “Every behavior is a little bit different and a little bit new.”
And studying blue whale behavior also helps scientists understand other animals.
“By looking at where blue whales are and what they’re doing, you can gain a lot of insight into the state of the ecosystem,” says Barlow. “These acoustic monitoring stations like the one at MBARI provide another way to listen in on the state of the ecosystem via the blue whales.”
Soon, the MBARI station will provide even more insight. The institute plans to establish a Blue Whale Observatory this year.
The observatory will combine several different types of technologies that will allow scientists to study the whales’ habitat, food and behavior in depth.
“Monterey Bay is one of the best places in the world to do that kind of integrative work,” says Oestreich, who will help lead the observatory alongside Ryan and MBARI researchers Kelly Benoit-Bird and Chad Walk.
Scientists estimate that after nearly going extinct from whaling, only about 10,000 blue whales exist today. The population along the West Coast is the largest in the world at around 2,000 individuals, and the data collected from the MBARI observatory will help reveal the best ways to protect these ocean giants.
“Where and when do blue whales need to be in order to gain the energy they need for this incredible life history and incredible long-distance migration,” says Ryan. “And how do those special places and times intersect with some of the threats that this endangered species still face?”
If we listen closely, the whales just might tell us.
Second Harvest Food Bank has a new leader, and Grey Bears is looking for its next.
Second Harvest on April 21 announced that Erica Padilla-Chavez will take the helm as CEO in July after Willy Elliot-McCrea retires, and as the organization celebrates its 50th anniversary. That announcement came just two days after longtime Grey Bears Executive Director, Tim Brattan, announced that he would retire by the end of the year, bringing an end to his 12-year tenure with the nonprofit.
In accepting the position, Padilla-Chavez will leave her post as CEO of Pajaro Valley Prevention and Student Assistance.
“I’m excited to be able to lend my skills and share my gifts with the talented team at Second Harvest, and the vast group of volunteers and community leaders and partners that have been addressing food insecurity issues in Santa Cruz County,” she says.
Her new position, she says, will allow her to continue her mission of advancing community-wide health and wellness by seeking to address the causes of hunger.
“In this opportunity, not only will I be able to continue providing continued access to food, but to work with community partners to address those root causes,” she says.
Under Brattan’s leadership, Grey Bears’ programs have grown to serve 4,500 seniors and thousands of business and residential customers throughout Santa Cruz County.
Since 1973, the organization’s Healthy Food program has delivered 110 million pounds of food and served more than 1 million meals to seniors, families, veterans and farmworkers. Their thrift stores, electronics refurbishing and recycling programs have diverted 250,000 tons of materials from waste streams to reduce the county’s collective carbon footprint. Thousands of mostly senior volunteers socialized while donating 3 million hours of service to make it all possible.
“It’s been such a privilege to have helped expand Grey Bears’ impact,” Brattan says. “Through the pandemic, CZU Complex fire and steep rise in basic living costs, meeting the need for food, meals, household items and opportunities to volunteer and socially connect are more important than ever—especially for those in our growing aging community.”
Brattan came aboard shortly after the Great Recession when “things really spiked, need grew quickly for food distribution and deliveries.”
“At the same time, there’s been this tsunami of aging in general across the country. It’s been a really interesting time,” Brattan says. “The last 12 years have been deeply fulfilling, challenging and exciting.”
Brattan says that the most rewarding part of the job has been the people he has worked with, who have helped the organization move forward through many different challenges, from expanding its physical infrastructure to the fallout of the pandemic.
“From the people we serve to those who work here, our donors, people who bring us donations from their offices and homes,” he says, “all of our partners in our community who help support our work. We’ve got a fantastic board [of directors], the best we’ve ever had, at least in my tenure. They’re really skilled, with great vision and resources to get us over our next benchmark.”
Brattan says he is tentatively set to leave in October, but the exact date is up in the air. He has plenty of personal projects planned for retirement—he teaches yoga, so he hopes to continue that, and will possibly do some traveling with his wife.
“Sometimes it’s important to unplug from something that you’re so deeply immersed in for so long in order to get perspective,” he says. “That’s what I’m looking forward to.”
Before then, Brattan says he hopes to aid Grey Bears in continuing to meet the needs of the community.
“Leaving is bittersweet,” Brattan says. “I’ve been thinking about those who came before me for 49 years. I’m only the fourth executive director, which speaks to our organization’s strengths and what a joy it is to be part of it.”
Padilla-Chavez’s move is somewhat of a homecoming for the Watsonville native. She attended local schools and graduated from Watsonville High School in 1994. She received her bachelor’s in sociology from UC Berkeley and a master’s in public administration from Golden Gate University in San Francisco.
She currently sits on Dominican Hospital’s Community Board, and is a member of RISE Together Santa Cruz County, an initiative from the Community Foundation Santa Cruz County that aims to advance racial equity in the region.
In addition, she is a member of the Hartnell College Board of Trustees, and has held multiple board positions throughout the Central Coast, including Radio Bilingue and the Community Foundation of Monterey County.
“I can’t imagine a better person than Erica to lead Second Harvest forward to the next level. She has a truly impressive track record of building partnerships and a life-long passion to ensure health and well-being for every member of our community,” Food Bank CEO Elliott-McCrea says.
Padilla-Chavez will officially join the staff of Second Harvest on July 18. Elliott-McCrea’s retirement begins July 31.
ARIES (March 21-April 19): I recommend you adopt a limitation that will enable you to claim more freedom. For example, you could de-emphasize your involvement with a lukewarm dream so as to liberate time and energy for a passionate dream. Or you could minimize your fascination with a certain negative emotion to make more room for invigorating emotions. Any other ideas? You’re in a phase when increased discipline and discernment can be liberating.
TAURUS (April 20-May 20): “Imagining anything is the first step toward creating it,” wrote author and activist Gloria Steinem. “Believing in a true self is what allows a true self to be born,” she added. Those are excellent meditations for you to focus on right now, Taurus. The time is ripe for you to envision in detail a specific new situation or adventure you would like to manifest in the future. It’s also a perfect moment to picture a truer, deeper, more robust version of your beautiful self—an expanded version of your identity that you hope to give birth to in the coming months.
GEMINI (May 21-June 20): Gemini author William Butler Yeats won a Nobel Prize for Literature, so I conclude he had considerable talent and wisdom. But he cultivated interests and ideas that were at variance with most other literary figures. For example, he believed fairies are real. He was a student of occult magic. Two of his books were dictated by spirits during séances. In the coming weeks, I invite you to draw inspiration from his versatile repertoire. Welcome knowledge in whatever unusual ways it might materialize. Be eager to accept power and inspiration wherever they are offered. For inspiration, here’s a Yeats’ quote: “I have observed dreams and visions very carefully, and am certain that the imagination has some way of lighting on the truth that reason has not, and that its commandments, delivered when the body is still and the reason silent, are the most binding we can ever know.”
CANCER (June 21-July 22): You know what’s always good for your well-being? Helping people who are less fortunate and less privileged than you. To enhance your health, you can also fight bigotry, campaign against the abuse of animals and remedy damage to the natural world. If you carry out tasks like these in the coming weeks, you will boost your vigor and vitality even more than usual. You may be amazed at the power of your compassion to generate selfish benefits for yourself. Working in behalf of others will uplift and nurture you. To further motivate you, here are inspirational words from designer Santiago Bautista: “I am in love with all the gifts of the world, and especially those destined for others to enjoy.”
LEO (July 23-Aug. 22): “There is a moment in each day that Satan cannot find,” wrote author and artist William Blake. Here’s how I interpret his poetic words: On a regular basis, you become relatively immune from the debilitating effects of melancholy, apathy and fear. At those times, you are blessed with the freedom to be exactly who you want to be. You can satisfy your soul completely. In the next six weeks, I suspect there will be more of these interludes for you than usual. How do you plan to use your exalted respite from Satan’s nagging?
VIRGO (Aug. 23-Sept. 22): Poet Louis Little Coon Oliver (1904–1991) was a member of the Indigenous Mvskoke people. He declared, “I do not waste what is wild.” That might mean something different for him than what it would mean for you, but it’s an excellent principle for you to work with in the coming weeks. You will have more access than usual to wildness, and you might be tempted to use it casually or recklessly. I hope that instead you harness all that raw mojo with precision and grace. Amazingly, being disciplined in your use of the wildness will ensure that it enriches you to the max and generates potent transformative energy.
LIBRA (Sept. 23-Oct. 22): I suspect you will have the skills of an acrobat in the coming weeks—at least metaphorically. You will be psychically nimble. Your soul will have an exceptional ability to carry out spry maneuvers that keep you sane and sound. Even more than usual, you will have the power to adjust on the fly and adapt to shifting circumstances. People you know may marvel at your lithe flexibility. They will compliment you for your classiness under pressure. But I suspect the feats you accomplish may feel surprisingly easy and breezy!
SCORPIO (Oct. 23-Nov. 21): A Tumblr blogger named Af-70 gives copious advice. From his wide selection of wise counsel, I have selected six tips that are right for your needs in the coming weeks. Please study the following counsel. 1. “Real feelings don’t change fast.” 2. “Connect deeply or not at all.” 3. “Build a relationship in which you and your ally can be active in each other’s growth.” 4. “Sometimes what you get is better than what you wanted.” 5. “Enjoy the space between where you are and where you are going.” 6. “Keep it real with me even if it makes us tremble and shimmer.”
SAGITTARIUS (Nov. 22-Dec. 21): Consider putting a sign on your door or a message on your social media that says something like the following: “I’ve still got some healing to do. While I’m making progress, I’m only partway there. Am open to your suggestions, practical tips and suggestions for cures I don’t know about.” Though the process is as yet incomplete, Sagittarius, I am proud of how diligent and resourceful you have been in seeking corrections and fixes. My only suggestions: 1. Be bold about seeking help and support. 2. Be aggressive about accessing your creativity. Expand your imagination about what might be therapeutic.
CAPRICORN (Dec. 22-Jan. 19): “To uncover what is hidden in my soul might take me a week or two,” my friend Allie told me. I told her she would be lucky if her brave and challenging exploration required such a short time. In contrast, some people I know have spent years trying to find what is buried and lost in their souls: me, for instance. There was one period of my life when I sought for over a decade to find and identify the missing treasure. According to my astrological analysis, you will soon enjoy multiple discoveries and revelations that will be more like Allie’s timeline than mine: relatively rapid and complete. Get ready! Be alert!
AQUARIUS (Jan. 20-Feb. 18): A Thai cook named Nattapong Kaweenuntawong has a unique method for cooking the soup served in his Bangkok restaurant. At the end of each night, he saves the broth for use the next day. He has been doing that daily for 45 years. Theoretically, there may be molecules of noodles that were originally thrown in the pot back in 1977. In accordance with current astrological omens, I urge you to dream up a new tradition that borrows from his approach. What experience could you begin soon that would benefit you for years to come?
PISCES (Feb. 19-March 20): Pisces-born Casimir Pulaski (1745–1779) was a Polish nobleman and military commander. As a young man, he fought unsuccessfully to free Poland from Russian domination. Driven into exile, he fled to America, arriving during the Revolutionary War with Britain in 1777. General George Washington was impressed with Pulaski’s skills, making the immigrant a brigadier general. He distinguished himself as a leader of American forces, exhibiting brilliance and bravery. For that excellence, he has been honored. But now, over two centuries later, his identity is in flux. DNA analyses of Pulaski’s remains suggest he was an intersex person with both male and female qualities. (Read more: tinyurl.com/PulaskiSmithsonian.) I bring this to your attention, Pisces, because the coming months will be a favorable time to question and revise your understanding of your identity. May you be inspired by Pulaski’s evolving distinctiveness.
The Bonny Doon home Santa Cruz County Superior Court Judge Syda Cogliati ruled could be used as a rehabilitation site for a man who raped multiple people in the early 1980s is now the subject of a lawsuit by neighbors.
With a ruling from the appeals court on that decision pending, area residents have sued Kassandra Hinton Ross, owner of the 310 Wild Iris Lane property, to stop Michael Cheek from taking up residence there.
“We were considering suing her back in September,” says Joe Brennan, who is leading the group of 22 plaintiffs. “When Judge Cogliati approved the placement, we decided to move forward.”
Liberty Healthcare Corporation says Cheek, a diagnosed “sexually violent predator” cleared for conditional release by the Department of State Hospitals, is “highly treated.”
In the lawsuit, filed Dec. 30, the plaintiffs claim the site violates the terms of release Cheek agreed to due to its remote location, poor internet connectivity and proximity to children.
They say the presence of a nearby homeschool site is one of the reasons Cheek should be prevented from moving in.
In approving the placement in November, Cogliati said the school appeared to have been established as a ploy to block Liberty Healthcare’s efforts to find a spot for the patient to live.
She also noted that Cheek’s rights are currently being violated since he already won release from state custody in a prior court process.
The defendant hired Santa Cruz-based Dibenedetto, Lapcevic & DRAA, LLP, on March 9, to beat back the new effort from neighbors.
And in a March 10 motion, lawyer William Lapcevic asked for more time to respond, noting he couldn’t even access documents from the ongoing appeal, due to confidentiality rules.
The neighbors are basing their lawsuit on “arguments which have already been rejected,” Lapcevic said in the suit.
I recently met up with my Wild Wine Women group at Odonata for a picnic lunch. Owner and winemaker Denis Hoey greeted us warmly and gave us a tour of his ever-evolving facility. Every time we visit, Hoey has made more upgrades to his property. He plied us that day with about 10 different wines, all outstanding, and saved the best for last: 2019 Blanc De Blanc sparkling wine ($42). “Citrus notes of lemon curd and orange blossom set the tone for this Santa Lucia Highlands sparkling wine,” says Hoey. “The palate is filled with flavors of green apple, citrus zest and a balanced finish.” All these flavors leap out of the glass as the celebratory bubbles work their way up to the surface. There’s nothing like sparkling wine to add a festive touch to any occasion. And Hoey’s bubbly is delicious. Along with several other wineries, Odonata is donating a percentage of its sales to the Breast Cancer Assistance Group from April 29 until May 1. bcagmc.org. Odonata Wines, 645 River Road, Salinas, 831-566-5147; odonatawines.com.
Vine to View Dinner Series at Chaminade
Tickets are on sale for Chaminade’s Vine to View farm-to-table dinner series. These wonderful dinners begin at 6pm and are held outside on the Courtyard Terrace. The first event is on April 29, and the other dates are May 27, June 30, July 29, Aug. 26, Sept. 30, Oct. 27 and Nov.18. chaminade.com.
Half Moon Bay Wine & Jazz Festival
Half Moon Bay Downtown Association is pulling out all the stops for a wine and jazz festival on its historic Main Street. Get a commemorative wine glass and explore the elixirs of about 50 participating wineries while listening to renowned jazz musicians. Beer and food will also be available for purchase. The event is Sunday, May 15, noon-4pm. hmbwineandjazzfest.com.
Chef Todd Parker’s résumé is as thick as the crispy cheese crust on the “inauthentic” Detroit-style square-shaped pies served at Bookie’s Pizza. Before jumping into the pizza world, the Mississippi native, a Culinary Institute of America graduate, cooked at two Michelin-starred restaurants in Germany before returning to the States, where he cooked at Santa Cruz’s Bad Animal and Los Gatos’ Manresa. Then, he pivoted from fine dining to pizza. Not just any pizza. Parker’s 2021 weekly pizza pop-ups were such a hit it’s now a permanent part of the Sante Adairius Brewery operation. Parker’s pizza and the brewery’s craft beer pair nicely with the modern-industrial space, boasting exposed ducts and beams, concrete floors, a wall of reclaimed book covers and live edge natural wood tables. There’s good reason for the scratch-made pizza’s popularity: Parker uses organic and all-natural ingredients to churn out classic pepperoni and cheese and barbeque chicken pies, made with multiple types of mozzarellas. But he also brings some of his gourmet history to the pizza—the Mushroom Meddle is made with porcini white sauce, oyster and maitake mushrooms, preserved lemons and nettles. Bring a bib! Hours are every day from noon-9pm (10pm Friday-Saturday). Parker dished to GT recently about his pizza and his professional experience.
Why ‘inauthentic?’
TODD PARKER: We call it “inauthentic” for a reason. We put a chef-driven artisanal spin with a California flair on a traditional Detroit-style pizza. They are served on a focaccia-style thick crust and baked in square pans. We use brick cheese that melts down the sides to create a crispy cheese crust, and even native Detroiters who try our pizza really love it.
How is Bookie’s different from the fine-dining world you came from?
Our restaurant is counter-service with an open kitchen, so you order at the bar and then come pick up the food directly from me. I really love getting to interact with every guest, see them eat and enjoy our product and get direct feedback from them. In fine dining, you don’t get that intimate interaction with the guest, and this aspect makes what I do now a lot more fulfilling. We try to take a Michelin star level of approach, dedication, finesse and attention to detail to a wider audience and offer a more approachable product.
Bookie’s Pizza is inside Sante Adairius Brewery, 1315 Water St., Santa Cruz, 831-246-6158; bookiespizza.com.
Dinner at Tramonti is everything that’s wonderful about Italian dining. Vivacious, atmospheric, unpretentious—and above all, delicious. Friends kept telling me about their memorable meals at this Seabright hot spot. I found out why as I and my companion (who spent several years in Rome) fell under the spell of the swift, warm service and rustic outdoor setting.
After his first sip of the house Chianti, and having polished off the first of several oven-roasted prawns wrapped in soppressata, he happily confessed, “It’s like being in Italy.” Well, it was. From the salt-free Italian bread already waiting at our table to the opulent cake and cream dessert, the meal was as authentic as Pavarati. Neither designer Italian nor Italian-American, Tramonti’s menu can be described as whatever the Italian term for “down home” is—the people’s authentic Italian food.
We started with glasses of red wine (generous pours), mine a light berry-and-herb-toned 2017 Nebbiolo from Stefano Farina ($14), and the house Chianti 2019 ($10). A starter of Gamberi alla Diavola—fat oven-roasted prawns enwrapped in soppressata, Parmigiano Reggiano and garlic—offered the signature red pepper kick ($18). Intensely flavorful, it was a dish made to be joined by our simpatico red wine, served at the perfect slightly cool temperature. Indoors and out, Tramonti was filling up with families, foursomes and date night couples, all in good spirits, which got even better as dinners progressed.
Our entrees arrived precisely as we finished the last prawn. Our waiter told us, “This is what the Roman soldiers ate,” as he presented the Pollo alla Romana ($30). Lucky soldiers. Sitting in the center of a large platter was half a free-range chicken that had been baked in the brick oven and then simmered into complete tenderness in a very light tomato sauce/broth along with potatoes, red bell peppers and onions, and dusted with fresh chopped parsley. The country-style flavors were simple and compelling. An order of Tortelloni (cappellacci) ($27) featured loosely hand-shaped pasta stuffed with succulent, slow braised beef short ribs. Sauteed in butter and whole sage leaves, each plump pasta was dusted with Parmigiano Reggiano and glistened seductively in the golden sunset light streaming across the table. Throughout dinner, our outstanding waiter Andrea—a native Italian, as are the Tramonti founders—explained the food and wine, offered suggestions and kept an eye on every table. So did his two associates. Taking conspicuous pleasure in his work, Andrea helped orchestrate a meal that became much more than just dinner. Just like our dining experiences in Italy.
And finally, from the hand of Tramonti’s sous chef Alessio Casagrande came a dessert to delight the child in us. Two layers of barely sweet chocolate cake had been thickly frosted with chilled rum-spiked pastry cream and topped with more pastry cream, bits of sweet crunchy meringue and raspberries, blueberries and a fat strawberry ($12). It was a fantasy that proved just a bit more than we could finish—but so much fun. My friends were right to praise Tramonti’s dinners. Grazie tutti! Open Monday-Friday, noon-3pm and 4-9pm; Saturday-Sunday, noon-9pm. 528 Seabright Ave., Santa Cruz. tramontisantacruz.com.
Wine in the Redwoods
Make reservations for May 22 to enjoy complex reds and elegant whites of the Santa Cruz Mountains paired with the farm-to-table cuisine of chef Brad Briske. A 90-minute wine reception starts at 4pm; a four-course dinner at 5:30pm. Tickets are $155; $132 for SCM wine club members. The wine dinner featuring vintages from various Santa Cruz Mountain labels will be held at Big Basin Vineyards’ Estate Vineyard & Winery, 830 Memory Lane, Boulder Creek.
The Gilroy Garlic Festival will not host its traditional event this year or for the “foreseeable future,” organizers announced this week.
A series of smaller, more intimate events still on tap for 2022 aim to bring the festival back to its roots and turn the primary focus back on its original mission: to celebrate garlic and the people behind it while giving back to the community.
In a statement, Garlic Festival Association Past President Tom Cline and Vice President-Elect Cindy Fellows cited “lingering uncertainties” from the Covid-19 pandemic, as well as “prohibitive insurance requirements by the City of Gilroy.”
“Obviously, we are left frustrated and disappointed,” the statement read. “Our world-renowned festival has helped showcase Gilroy and the South County for 42 years while raising many millions of dollars for local charities.”
Cline says the Garlic Festival Association, now an all-volunteer organization, received no revenue since the start of the pandemic in early 2020 to July 2021, when it hosted a series of events.
Before that, the association was losing money for roughly a decade, due to rising costs that included bussing attendees into Christmas Hill Park when the Glen Loma Ranch development took over a vacant lot previously used for parking.
According to financials released by the festival in late 2019, the association donated $250,000 to 155 local charities and nonprofit organizations that year. However, while gross income increased slightly to $3.08 million, the festival lost about $100,000, in addition to $400,000 in 2018.
Insurance premiums have skyrocketed in recent years, making them unrealistic for the festival, according to Cline. And that’s on top of the challenges of finding a company willing to insure, which Cline says the festival was unable to do so due to dwindling options as many companies are ditching California because of wildfire risk.
The City of Gilroy requires special events to have a minimum general liability coverage of $1 million for any events happening on city property.
Cline says that although the association does have coverage of $1 million, the city is requiring “much more” for the festival.
Further complicating matters, the association is among the defendants named in a series of lawsuits following the 2019 shooting at the festival that left three dead and 17 others injured. The cases continue to wind through the court system.
The association had already been discussing how to reimagine the festival prior to 2019. Now, it’s going all-in on its evolution.
“The festival is part of our heritage,” the statement from Cline and Fellows reads. “Now we must ensure that it is part of our future. While it will never be the massive event of the past, a more intimate, local festival can still allow us to celebrate the community, garlic and all it inspires.”
The second annual Garlic Festival golf tournament is scheduled for June 24 at the Gilroy Golf Course.
That will be followed by a country music concert at Clos LaChance Winery on July 13, and a farm-to-table dinner in September.
Fellows says the introduction of smaller events in 2021 was a success for the association, and the organization hopes to expand on that for 2022.
She noted that although the events will be smaller than the massive festivals of the past, they still contain all the elements that made the festival what it is: good food for a good cause in a family-friendly environment.
“Everyone focuses on what we had been,” Cline says. “Scaling it back takes nothing away from the impact it’s had on the community. It’s a treasure. It’s a family reunion for so many people. Why can’t we have it in a more intimate setting?”
Festival organizers are appealing to the community for ideas and support on how to continue the festival’s mission into the future. For contact information, visit gilroygarlicfestivalassociation.com.
