Page 759 | Good Times

Film Review: On Chesil Beach

A&E
Film

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June 12, 2018

Back in 1966, there was a low-key British movie called The Family Way, about young newlyweds too wracked with nerves, their families’ expectations, and their own inexperience to properly consummate their marriage. The situation was played for gentle, poignant humor, as the days wore on, and the already embarrassed young couple had to cope with well-meaning interference from both families attempting to cheerlead them on and offer advice. The film gained attention at the time for launching star Hayley Mills out of her Disney/Pollyanna box and into her first grown-up role.

It seems like there are going to be faint echoes of The Family Way—without the humor—in the domestic drama, On Chesil Beach. Scripted by Ian McEwan, from his own novel, and directed by Dominic Cooke, it’s the story of a young couple navigating the first few hours of married life at a seaside hotel on the evening of their wedding day. But in this case, the fateful wedding night doesn’t just launch the story; it is the story.

Yes, its aftermath plays out into the future in a couple of brief, clumsy time-shifts at the very end of the movie. And their early relationship as the couple falls in love is told in flashbacks throughout the day in that hotel room. But sloppy, inconsistent storytelling keeps us from getting caught up in the tale’s emotional core, and the audience, too, leaves unsatisfied.

The story is set in 1962, just before the ’60s began to swing. Florence (Saoirse Ronan) and Edward (Billy Howle) arrive at a nice hotel on the Dorset coast to begin their honeymoon. It’s late afternoon, and after a walk on the beach, their nervous attempts to become more intimate are interrupted, first by a pair of buffoony comic waiters, but mostly by a series of flashbacks to their courtship.

She’s the daughter of wealthy, snobby society parents, who plays violin with a string quartet she founded at Oxford. He’s a working-class scholar who earned a First in History, also at Oxford, and maintains his good cheer, despite his addled Mum (Anne-Marie Duff). But his mum and family adore Florence (her winning them over provides some of the movie’s best scenes), and the couple have come to the altar with their future together looking bright.

But it turns out there’s a skeleton in the closet of Florence’s past, making their wedding night extra fraught. Matters aren’t made any easier by the fact that they are both virgins. McEwan’s point seems to be that, in a repressed era when sex is simply not discussed, demons remain unexorcised, and consequences can be severe, reaching out their menacing tentacles to affect lives far into the future.

But McEwan and Cooke can’t get a grip on their narrative. Most of the story proceeds from Edward’s viewpoint, so it often seems like he’s being victimized by Florence’s mystifying behavior. Then, a pivotal decision he makes half an hour before the movie’s end alters that scenario—but it’s withheld from the audience until literally the last few frames of the film.

Maybe the story played better on the page, where the author had the luxury of time and space to grow his character motivations. On the other hand, I loved the movie Atonement, also based on a McEwan novel, and also depicting the ways that sexual fear and loathing might poison present and future lives. But that movie deployed a trenchant coda that crystallized the story’s themes with a wallop.

No such coherent wrap-up occurs here. The story elements all seem to be in place, but the filmmakers never manage to turn the dross of pervasive melancholy into the gold of transcendent meaning.

ON CHESIL BEACH

** (out of four)

With Saoirse Ronan, Billy Howle, and Anne-Marie Duff. Written by Ian McEwan. Directed by Dominic Cooke. A Bleecker Street release. Rated R. 110 minutes.

The Vision for for a Revamped Civic Auditorium

Local News

Georgia Johnson

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June 12, 2018

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The Vision for for a Revamped Civic Auditorium

To Ellen Primack, executive director of the Cabrillo Festival of Contemporary Music, Santa Cruz Civic Auditorium renovations represent a long overdue dream. A crowd of around 20 gathered at the auditorium steps on June 7 to express support for the renovations, pointing to its lack of handicap accommodations and air conditioning, and its generally outdated and under-utilized state. It was, after all, built in 1939.

“From a Cabrillo Festival standpoint, the facility is not serving our elders,” Primack says. “The seating is becoming a deterrent to cultural participation, and we are not the only ones. People will make choices; they choose between beautiful facilities over the hill and coming here, so we want to make sure that we have that point to bring them here.”

In the last nearly 80 years, the Civic Auditorium has hosted the Miss California Pageant and countless Santa Cruz Follies shows and high school graduations. It’s also home to the annual Martin Luther King Convocation, and, over the years, it’s brought in Bob Dylan, the Dalai Lama, Elie Wiesel, and the Pixies, among many others. The hall was primarily built for sports, as evidenced by the court-facing seating and gymnasium flooring.

But with the construction of the temporary Kaiser Permanente Arena, those sports events have, for the most part, found a newer home. Though the auditorium draws more than 85,000 people annually, it lacks the allure and functionality to compete with other venues, and it can be a difficult selling point for Santa Cruz, particularly when trying to attract bigger-name speakers and performers.

“This building is intended to present the best of Santa Cruz’s past, present and future. Today we are lucky to have the highest quality performances right here, but the facility is letting down the performers and guests,” says Santa Cruz Mayor David Terrazas. “The Civic is not living up to its potential currently, we need to do more to ensure the safety of visitors and performers and we have a ways to go to catch up to today’s standards for comfort and amenities.”

A new group, Friends of the Civic Auditorium, has formed to support the renovations. Their goal is to raise awareness and funding.

Since the foundation of the auditorium is structurally sound, Primack says the renovations will focus primarily on modernization. The Civic Leadership Team first formed in 2012, and eventually partnered with ELS Architecture and Urban Design. Together they came up with a plan that includes retractable seating for around 1,700 audience members (which is actually a downsize from the current 2,000-seat capacity), an open rooftop balcony, elevators and second-floor entrances. They’re also looking to update the lighting and technical equipment, while expanding the lobby and concessions bar. The David and Lucile Packard Foundation sponsored the surveys and business planning studies, as well as the current outreach efforts. Although Arts Council Santa Cruz County is the group’s current fiscal sponsor, no one has yet to contribute any funding to the renovations. The group is looking to raise an additional $20 million to implement the proposed renovations.

“The biggest obstacles are resources, because this is becoming a much more immediate and urgent need,” Primack says. “We need to educate the public about the immediacy of it in the context of all of the other major needs of our community.”

Looking ahead, the group imagines paying the bill will require both private investment and public funding, including grant applications. They are hoping to start a movement, and potentially have a ballot measure put forth by the city of Santa Cruz, though Primack says they aren’t sure about the specifics. Santa Cruz’s quarter-cent sales tax just passed earlier this month to preserve existing programs, but in recent years, city leaders have floated the idea of a future ballot measure to fund the Civic and other projects, including the Santa Cruz Municipal Wharf and a possible new basketball arena for the Santa Cruz Warriors.

Right now, though, it’s the auditorium that’s in the spotlight.

“It really starts with public education, outreach and advocacy,” Primack says. “Ideally this vision is broadcast to anyone who steps in the building.”

For more information, visit friendsofthecivic.org.

County’s Health Services Agency Under Fire

Local News

Andrea Patton

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June 12, 2018

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County’s Health Services Agency Under Fire

Michael Fitzgerald was homeless for four years in the late 1970s and into the early ’80s in Santa Cruz, while struggling with mental health challenges.

After recovering, he entered the mental health care industry, and he now serves as technical advisor for the National Alliance on Mental Illness of Santa Cruz County (NAMI). He says county government leaders need to do a better job of handling mental health crises.

“Looking at other counties, we could learn from some of their approaches. Santa Cruz is, unfortunately, an outlier,” Fitzgerald says.

He isn’t the only one with concerns.

Santa Cruz Mayor David Terrazas says that mental health struggles of people on the streets have created “the number one issue” facing downtown. Folks in need of psychological support, he says, can create a visible—and often noisy—impact. Since Terrazas’ term began late last year, he has repeatedly pushed for more collaboration on mental health issues, starting with his Dec. 20 column in the Santa Cruz Sentinel titled “We Can’t Do It Alone.”

“A well-run and effective mental health services response in our region is something in all of our interests,” Terrazas tells GT, “and especially for the city of Santa Cruz.”

The county’s Health Services Agency—particularly the portions dealing with mental health—have been taking heat from multiple sides lately.

Homeless advocates Sibley Simon and John Deitz say the agency can be an inadequate partner, one that does a poor job managing the intersection of homelessness and various kinds of illness. A Santa Cruz County Grand Jury report, released in May, called for county behavioral health professionals to accompany law enforcement on more calls. A few weeks prior to that, Santa Cruz’s Greg Larson, former town manager for Los Gatos, filed an online petition that gained 2,668 signatures calling for increased transparency with mental health funding, after local woman Sarah Shinsky was attacked near the clock tower by a mentally ill man. The petition accused the county of sitting on $15 million in tax revenues. Essentially, he says he wanted to call for more accountability on how the HSA, the county’s largest department, spends its mental health money.

County officials pushed back on the details, and Larson quickly modified the petition’s wording.

“Our unspent funds are less than $3 million,” says Pam Rogers-Wyman, the HSA’s adult services director. “That’s been really a misnomer that we’re sitting on millions of dollars. I think we’ve tried to correct it several times.”

State law, she adds, requires the agency to keep a certain amount of funding in its reserves.

Other local activists, from both the left and the right—including the public safety group Take Back Santa Cruz—have lined up with criticisms of their own. And a NAMI report from this past fall identified key areas where the HSA needs to improve, calling for better oversight of the contracted mental health care provider Telecare. The report noted that the number of beds available for people experiencing a mental health crisis is critically low in Santa Cruz County. It showed that the discrepancy impacts everything from emergency room treatment times to an increased presence of people on the street who would normally be hospitalized.

In a California State Auditor’s report, Santa Cruz County was one of 12 mental health agencies statewide that did not submit their fiscal year report by the December 2017 deadline. The agency was one of six that didn’t submit reports for either of the past two years.

“We’re behind, and we do expect to file those reports quickly,” says county spokesperson Jason Hoppin, who says the problem stemmed from a software switchover. “It was internal. It doesn’t excuse us.”

At the end of May, Health Services Agency Director Giang Nguyen left her post at the county, but officials said they couldn’t discuss the reasons for her departure.

Rogers-Wyman says the biggest problems Santa Cruz County faces are not unique to this area.

“I think it feels for every community from San Diego to Crescent City, anyone along the coast, that we’re dealing with an issue around lack of low-income housing, poverty, and behavioral health system that is not adequately funded for the need. We spend every penny we get, and we leverage it as far as we can, but it’s not that much money,” she says.

NO SURE BED

Santa Cruz County has less than a fourth of the number of inpatient offerings recommended by Treatment Advocacy Center, which advocates for 50 beds per 100,000 residents. With a total of 16 beds, Santa Cruz County has only six beds per 100,000 residents. That is half of California’s average, as noted in the NAMI report. That report was dedicated in part to the memory of Sean Arlt, who was shot and killed by Santa Cruz Police officers shortly after he was released from a brief stay at the Behavioral Health Center without stabilizing from a psychotic episode.

Progressive activist Denise Elerick feels that local hospitals aren’t doing their share when it comes to mental health, either, further compounding problems at the HSA. She’s also frustrated with a local perception that mental health issues pose a serious safety hazard to the entire community.

Rogers-Wyman says she and her colleagues are aware of the inpatient issue and are working toward a solution.

“We are not necessarily looking at additional inpatient beds within the county. We are working on a contract with an inpatient unit over the hill as an overflow, but we are working with Telecare on developing more of a continuum where we can best utilize our inpatient beds,” she says, noting that Encompass is also a crisis residential facility geared toward patients who no longer need a locked-down setting. “That is a continuous discussion.”

SEEKING COVERAGE

Affordable housing entrepreneur Sibley Simon says that when someone’s homeless, it’s impossible to solve their mental health difficulties without also addressing their need for housing.

“You can spend all these resources in the hospital, on medication, and it does not help at all for many different major medical issues,” Simon says. “People die when they’re homeless of things that wouldn’t kill anyone else.”

Around the county, nonprofits on the front lines of this issue are increasingly using the Homeless Management Information System (HMIS) to make sure everyone is on the same page when it comes to tracking the county’s neediest people. Simon lauds the Homeless Persons Health Project, a county HSA program, for using HMIS and for its work with people living on the streets, more generally. But he notes that the rest of the Health Services Agency doesn’t use the system.

He compares the situation to a doctor who isn’t interested in looking at a patient’s medical records or sharing information with other doctors.

“It’s the equivalent, in case management, of medical records,” he says. “It’s information about what programs they’ve been a part of, what challenges they’ve had, how long have they been homeless here, what ailments and characteristics have been diagnosed, what services they’re getting from other partners, comments on what’s been effective, what hasn’t, their history.”

John Dietz, one of the founders of the 180/2020 program to end chronic homelessness, says he’s seen a high percentage of people return to homelessness, often after receiving one year of services through the county. And the county, he feels, does a poor job of following up with people. The needs of a recently housed person often develop into a mental health crisis that spirals until they get evicted.

“The problem they’re having is loneliness,” he says. “The client doesn’t have anyone to talk to. No one is checking in on them. They’re falling back on bad habits.”

Hoppin says the county officials know there are some holes in the safety net, and they’re working to patch them with new solutions like Whole Person Care, the new tech-driven program aimed at aiding the neediest county residents.

“While we have services available for people in crisis and those who suffer from severe mental illness, it’s true that more can be done for mild and moderate cases,” he says. “We expect to develop these services once Whole Person Care is fully operational, and we also now have follow-up care available for those being treated for substance-use disorder through the recent expansion of those services under Medi-Cal, which the county is helping to fund.”

City Councilmember Cynthia Chase says that while she understands many of the critiques lobbed at county health, she has seen that frustration can go too far at times.

Chase, who also works as the inmate program manager at the Santa Cruz County Sheriff’s Office, says the community needs to remember that the county is a partner and not an enemy—especially if it wants to get positive results. “You can go down a rabbit hole of misinformation, and end up creating adversaries where we should be creating partnerships,” she says.

REASON FOR HOPE

While it is uncommon to see one county agency garner so much criticism from so many different camps, that doesn’t mean there’s consensus on everything that should be done better.

For their part, public safety activists from Take Back Santa Cruz (TBSC) feel that the HSA could be more proactive about referring addicts to treatment options and improving the Santa Cruz County Syringe Services Program, commonly known as the needle exchange.

The program is designed to stop the spread of disease among intravenous drug users. David Giannini, a member of TBSC’s executive committee, suggests the program try doing a one-for-one exchange—so that a user may only receive one syringe for every dirty one they bring in—or some other mechanism to incentivize users to bring back each syringe, instead of littering them about.

“If you could find some way to make used syringes valuable,” says Giannini, whose 18 years sober from addictions of his own, “then my brothers and sisters who are still out there using, would gather them up and find them a way to give them back.”

Other activists, including Elerick, have long held that stricter exchanges will do a poorer job of reducing the spread of disease and may do nothing to curb littering. She notes that many homeless people often have their belongings—including clean syringes—stolen or sometimes swept up in camp clean-ups. She says more syringe disposal sites would be a more rational solution.

In general, Fitzgerald says the most important step for the HSA to take is to start a dialogue and better involve the community.

He compares the Santa Cruz region to San Luis Obispo County, a similarly sized coastal community that also grapples with homelessness. “According to their MHSA plan, they have a very robust engagement with their community compared with Santa Cruz, where there was virtually none. It’s an opportunity for us to improve,” says, Fitzgerald, who’s also executive director of behavioral health services at El Camino Hospital in Mountain View. “The mental health director needs to lead this, but the community must accept the challenge and become engaged.”

Faith leaders and business owners are beginning to step up.

Father Milutin Janjic, of the Prophet Elias Church, says his congregants asked him to call a meeting with Mayor Terrazas, Police Chief Andy Mills, and county health leaders for members of the church to learn about services available for mental health.

At the meeting, Rogers-Wyman shared information about the new program HOPES, which allows community members to make referrals for mental health through the website santacruzhealth.org/hopesteam. She made a similar presentation at the Downtown Association meeting a few days later.

Since its unpublicized launch in mid-March, the county has received 90 referrals, and Rogers-Wyman says the county is actively managing about 30 of those individuals, 10 of which they’ve gotten off the street and into residential treatment for either substance disorder or mental health.

Janjic says his church, which is located across the street from the library and Santa Cruz City Hall, has outreach programs to help people in need, including the homeless.

“We’ve developed some kind of relationship with them, and then we see how desperate they are for help, especially those with mental health issues,” he says. “We would like to see how we, as a part of the Santa Cruz community, could help, but we would also like to see what the city, county and state, are doing to help those people.”

Preview: Joel Selvin to Appear at Bookshop Santa Cruz with New Book about the Grateful Dead

Wallace Baine

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June 12, 2018

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Preview: Joel Selvin to Appear at Bookshop Santa Cruz with New Book about the Grateful Dead

Let’s be clear—Joel Selvin’s new book is not about the Grateful Dead.

Technically, it’s about the ruins of the Grateful Dead. It’s about what happened when Jerry Garcia, the band’s lodestar and spiritual leader, died. It’s about the vacuum that Garcia’s death left behind, and the collateral damage that followed.

Rock bands dealing with (or not dealing with) the death of their members is an old and tired story. But the Grateful Dead wasn’t just a rock band. It was an industry, a mission, a society, a stand-alone entertainment empire. And Garcia was no ordinary rock guitarist. He was the embodiment of the hippie principle that gave the band its mystique.

Selvin, the veteran music journalist for the San Francisco Chronicle, will come to Bookshop Santa Cruz on June 21 to talk about Fare Thee Well: The Final Chapter of the Grateful Dead’s Long Strange Trip (Da capo). From his perch at the Chronicle, Selvin has been covering the Dead for decades and he was perfectly positioned to watch how the band dealt with the death of its icon.

Garcia died in his sleep in August 1995 at the age of 53. Despite a series of well-publicized health issues due partly to addiction and bad habits, nobody was anticipating Garcia’s demise, says Selvin.

“They had no contingencies in place whatsoever,” he says. “They had never contemplated life without Jerry. He had almost died, had been in a coma, had been in a long, slow recovery and never returned to healthy living, but continued on in these bad habits. But those guys were stunned. They just couldn’t believe it.”

Today, three of the four surviving members of the Dead—guitarist Bob Weir, drummer Bill Kreutzmann and percussionist Mickey Hart—are in the midst of a big summer tour as Dead & Company, which also includes guitarist John Mayer. (Dead & Company comes to Shoreline Amphitheatre July 2 and 3). Also, bassist Phil Lesh has performed in a duo with Weir as recently as last March.

Since Garcia’s death, there have been a number of spin-off bands featuring one or more of the surviving members that sought to fill the Jerry-sized void: RatDog, The Other Ones, Phil Lesh & Friends, Further, The Dead. All four members came together for a hugely lucrative 50th anniversary tour in 2015. But these reunions and collaborations paper over a fraught history, says Selvin. It has taken more than 20 years for the living Dead to find its equilibrium again.

“The first thing they could manage to do—and it took four months to get around to doing that—was to put out a press release saying that they’ll never perform as the Grateful Dead again,” says Selvin of those first weeks post-Jerry. “It just didn’t make any sense. It destroyed a perfectly good asset for these guys. Frankly, it was the same kind of instinctual foot-shooting that the band has specialized in since the very beginning. But it was a product of this immense grief, and that’s what this book to me is about: These guys fell into this incredible pit of grief and their world was so turned over by it that they each had to find out who they were and what the Grateful Dead was to them, and who they were to each other.”

Of the four remaining members of the band, Hart and Weir participated in a series of interviews. Kreutzmann contemplated sitting for an interview, but ultimately decided against it, deciding to “take the high road.” Only Lesh did not respond to Selvin’s requests.

The book also chronicles the Dead’s uniquely communal and democratic way of doing business and managing a multi-million-dollar empire, and how that method crumbled after Garcia’s death. “For the longest time, throughout the entire history of the Grateful Dead, all votes were unanimous,” says Selvin. “One no vote could stop something from going through.” What’s more, the Dead practiced an effective code of silence to outsiders when it came to their relations with each other. That façade cracked after Garcia’s death. Surviving members began writing letters to each other for public consumption. A prominent lawsuit involving Garcia’s estate aired even more dirty laundry. Something—some ineffable Grateful Dead magic—had broken.

Selvin’s story eventually reflects back on Garcia and the way he held the band together by the sheer power of his personality. “Jerry was remarkable, in so many ways. His leadership style in that band was entirely passive,” says Selvin. “And he arranged the situation so that everyone else looked to him for his approval. Each one of those four guys thought Jerry Garcia was their best friend. They had no sense of each other, anything like that. What was it like? Think of spokes and a hub. That’s what it was like.”

Joel Selvin, author of ‘Fare Thee Well: The Final Chapter of the Grateful Dead’s Long Strange Trip’ will be at Bookshop Santa Cruz at 7 p.m. on Thursday, June 21. 1520 Pacific Ave., Santa Cruz. Free. bookshopsantacruz.com.

Preview: Barna Howard to Play at Flynn’s Cabaret

A&E
Music

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June 12, 2018

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Preview: Barna Howard to Play at Flynn’s Cabaret

There’s a dive bar across the street from where singer-songwriter Barna Howard lives in Portland, Oregon. He was sitting there one day when he saw a man who he was acquainted with looking distraught, so much that he seemed like he needed to cry, but wouldn’t let himself do it.

“I looked at him and then I thought, ‘Man just let it go.’ He was holding it in,” Howard says. “I wrote a song called ‘Corner of Your Eye’ about that guy. It’s a song about men not wanting to cry in public.”

This is one tune of many that people will hear on Howard’s as-of-yet-unreleased third album, which he hopes to record this fall. It’s a pretty big shift for the singer-songwriter, whose first two records were very much focused intimately on himself: Barna Howard (2012) and Quite a Feelin’ (2015).

Both of those records evoke the sound, aesthetic and even the texture of ’70s soft rock singer-songwriters à la James Taylor and Gordon Lightfoot. In fact, both of the album covers look weathered and stylized to the point that you can imagine finding them in vintage record stores. The recording and the quality of the music gives the same feeling. These are lost ’70s acoustic gems, yet they were created this decade.

“People have said that, ‘Oh you’re an old soul, Barna.’ I take it as a compliment,” Howard says. “I just love that era, that sound, especially the old son writers. I don’t know why it’s always just clicked with me as far as a canvas to work with. It’s comfortable to be there, but I do try to push myself.”

The third record will very likely sound similar to his first album in terms of style, but with better production, and, he says, some new tricks up his sleeve.

Those first two records were not only incredibly personal, they were also tied very much to location. Howard grew up in Eureka, Missouri, a very rural, small town. The first record is about leaving that town, which he did roughly 15 years ago in his early 20s. The second one is reflective, looking back at his small-time life, contrasting it with his life in the big city, and looking for meaning within that juxtaposition.

From his album Quite a Feelin’, the lyrics from his song “Indiana Rose” exemplify this perfectly. (“Because that old song was all we left behind/Those regrets, I feel ’em all the time/The love we once had, it’s hard to find/Now it’s hard to know.”)

Needless to say, his small-town upbringing factored in to his music in a significant way.

“I never lived the city life. I was about 21 when I moved to Chicago, that was the first time. I was blown away,” he says. “I didn’t belong there, but I also did. I think once I got to the city, or once I got out of Missouri, I just all of a sudden was wanting to write songs. I was like ‘Oh shit, I’ll write about that now.’”

Oddly, it was once he was in Chicago that he really honed his “rustic” sound, which came by way of record hunting in the city’s numerous record stores. He discovered all of these brilliant songwriters from the ’70s that clicked with his sensibilities.

“I just started listening to a lot of country and folk singer-songwriters. I got inspired. It was like ‘I think I can do this,’” Howard says.

Now on this third record, he’s not really looking back at his small-town roots anymore. In fact, he’s not really looking much at himself.

“Each song will be about a person that I know. They’ll unknowingly have a song written about them,” he says. “It could be sad, it could be upbeat. I’m writing about, in a sense, what I know.”

Howard says he had major writer’s block last year, as well some tough times personally. But things have changed this year as he’s reshaped what he wants to write about and has gotten things on track again.

“I think I was denying some material that was always in front of me. I kind of reminded myself what it meant to write a song, what the process is, and kind of stripped back. It started out easy and it filled it back up again,” Howard says.

INFO: Barna Howard plays at 7 p.m. on June 17 at Flynn’s Cabaret & Steakhouse, 6275 Hwy. 9, Felton. $15. 335-2800.

New Leaf’s Deli and Juice Bar Save Lunch in a Pinch

Food & Drink

Christina Waters

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June 12, 2018

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New Leaf’s Deli and Juice Bar Save Lunch in a Pinch

It was a lunch review that was not to be. No place to park! We drove a circle ’round it thrice (apologies to Coleridge)—the downtown of Santa Cruz that is—but between the endless orange cones of city work crews and my hobbled post-surgery right foot, found no parking spots within walking distance, and decided to cut our losses and head back toward home. The Westside New Leaf was on our radar for some emergency lunch supplies. And when we got back home we laid out an intriguing array of found foods, starting with a custom green smoothie called Green Gardens. From two containers of Shakti Indian entrees ($7.99 each)—liberated from New Leaf’s very well-stocked deli shelves—we piled our plates with saffron rice, intense spinachy palak paneer, a thick dahl, and a lentil coconut curry studded with spiced carrots, cauliflower and peas. We applied a bit of microwave heat, a dash of Patak’s Hot Mango Chutney and a splash of Sriracha. Don’t be afraid to customize whatever you grab from the brimming deli section—make it your own! Jack added a side helping of his favorite Epicurean Solutions curried tofu with cashews and currants ($4.50)

Fresh organic cherries, at their absolute dark crimson peak, created our dessert. And the emerald green health drink, loaded with celery, ginger, lemon, kale and cucumber, was a serious thirst-quencher ($7). Our super veggie lunch items made an outstanding alternative to the sandwich. But I’m still hoping to get to my downtown destination sometime in the next few weeks. I might need to re-think transportation options into the very heart of Santa Cruz. Parking is a major challenge just now. (I will not be using one of those red motorized bikes!) Stay tuned!

Tidbits

Happy second anniversary to Paul Figliomeni’s Pour Taproom, made even better these days thanks to the inventive in-house Surf City Kitchen pub menu created by chef Anthony Kresge (whose talent has fueled Shadowbrook’s kitchen and, more recently, started up Sotola Grill & Bar in Capitola.) Figliomeni opened Soquel’s Surf City Sandwich in 2015, and has now stepped in to collaborate with the downtown home of countless beers on tap. 110 Cooper St., Santa Cruz. Food and beer daily from 11:30 a.m.-10 p.m. Monday-Saturday, and until 9 p.m. Sunday.

Tiki Correction

Hula’s Island Grill serves lunch daily except for Monday. It opens at 4:30 p.m. on Mondays, just in time for those tempting Happy Hour drinks and pupus of Mahalo Monday.

Product of the Week

Glutino brand makes some tasty gluten-free products. And our new favorite is a surprisingly delicious English muffin with luscious mouthfeel. The multi-grain is the best, but even the plain vanilla version (that’s a metaphor: it’s actually a blend of tapioca and rice flours) is excellent too. Of course the whole point of the English muffin is its texture, and that’s where gluten-free breads and pastries are often most challenged. Glutino’s muffins offer an appealing texture, slightly chewy, tender, and in the case of the multi-grain variety, loaded with something close to crunch, thanks to flax seed, sunflowers seeds, brown rice, and millet flour. No one would ever mistake these for the real deal, but they make a very nice platform for lots of butter and jam over a cup of serious Italian roast coffee. Not exactly cheap—roughly $1 per muffin, i.e., $6 per six-pack. But if you are avoiding gluten, these babies are like a hit of pure oxygen, a jolt of actual flavor and texture. In other words, they are worth every penny. We keep some in our freezer 24/7. Available everywhere.

Opinion June 6, 2018

Steve Palopoli

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June 6, 2018

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EDITOR’S NOTE

I’ve long thought that what happened to the 1946 film adaptation of Raymond Chandler’s novel The Big Sleep is great illustration of two distinct ways of looking at the noir genre. The Howard Hawks-directed movie was originally completed in 1945 with a tight, clever narrative (adapted primarily by William Faulkner) that fully explained the case that Humphrey Bogart as Philip Marlowe had gotten himself wrapped up in.

But as the pairing of Bogart with Lauren Bacall was becoming a national phenomenon, producer Jack Warner was convinced to add new scenes with the couple. The film that was finally released was only two minutes longer, but it had more than 20 minutes of different footage. It also made no sense, because what was cut out to allow for the new scenes was the explanation of what was actually going on. Most people didn’t care too much, because the Bogie and Bacall scenes feature some of the best onscreen chemistry in the history of film, and the released version’s quintessential noir attitude and atmosphere helped make it a huge hit. Only in 1997 did the public get to see the complete original version, sparking a debate about what is more important to successful noir: a great story, or incredible style?

I put this question to Susie Bright and Willow Pennell, the editor and associate editor of the new Santa Cruz Noir anthology, and they came back with a split decision on The Big Sleep. Bright prefers the story-first approach of the original, untinkered-with film, while Pennell felt the added scenes between the co-stars are why we consider it one of the best noir films of all time today. I just like that this team of noir editors had a representative from both camps; it certainly helps explain why the resulting book is full of both tightly wound narratives and endless hardboiled atmosphere. In my cover story this week, they explain what it took to pull together this short-fiction walk through Santa Cruz County’s dark side. It’s a thrilling, whip-smart book that will dazzle local lovers of crime fiction, and I hope you enjoy this look at how it was made.

LETTERS TO THE EDITOR

Read the latest letters to the editor here.

Mind Explorers

Thank you for your article on Michael Pollan and his mind-altering experimentation (GT, 5/30).

This is not new to Santa Cruz, however. Santa Cruz has been fertile ground for experimentation from the early 1960s to present day. Please reference the work Ralph Abraham and others have done in this regard at HipSantaCruz.org.

In 1977, Linkage, a small group of futuristic visionaries, brought Dr. Albert Hofmann, the person who inadvertently discovered LSD, to UCSC for his first visit to the United States for a conference entitled “LSD – A Generation Later.” This was a time when many of the second generation of mind explorers laid the groundwork for what was erroneously mislabeled as the “New Age.”

The process for mind exploration was laid by many professional people from all walks of life with much emphasis on the pioneering work of Ralph Metzner, Richard Alpert (Ram Dass,) and Timothy Leary. (In spite of the controversial media coverage in those days precipitated by President Richard Nixon, who thought Leary was “The Most Dangerous Man in America.” He was arrested and imprisoned as a “political prisoner” for a half a joint found in his car!)

There was a second conference at UCSC in 1981 that paved the way for the integration of the experimental and spiritual work that laid the foundation for Pollan’s recent successful explorations. This foundation was laid by many people in the Bay Area who maintained the unwavering belief that there is a different lifestyle that can bring love, peace, and nutriment to our planet and its peoples. It continues to this day. Thank you, Michael, for being a current champion and taking us another step forward toward the fifth generation.

Lynda Francis | Santa Cruz

Guilt Tripping

The city of Santa Cruz is currently considering where to put the next homeless camp, after River Street. At the Council meeting last Tuesday, after the public expressed passionate opposition to each of the sites under consideration, Councilwoman Cynthia Chase said that there would be opposition to any site. In other words, a camp is going somewhere—public be damned.

I am part of the opposition to the Soquel Park and Ride site. Why would I not want a homeless camp near my house? Surely you have heard the arguments already. So where should a homeless camp go? For me to propose another site would be to accept the city’s premise that there must be a homeless camp, and to say that someone else’s neighborhood is less worthy of protection than my own. Instead, I invite every resident to fearlessly and enthusiastically stand up for their own neighborhood. If you don’t, then who will? It is time that we all stand up to the guilt-tripping and intimidation from local government on the homeless issue. Enough is enough.

Geoffrey Ellis | Santa Cruz

Ecological Sense

Santa Cruz is committed to fight climate change. Half of our carbon emissions come from cars. We need public transit that truly serves our needs. We need safe and simple bike infrastructure that gets people out of their cars. End of story. So let’s do this!

The Rail and Trail leaves our options open for electric light-rail or battery-electric rail if and when the investment makes economic sense (I would argue that it makes ecological sense today, but we’ll fight that battle later.) It would be incredibly short sighted to remove that possibility, especially when there is plenty of room along the corridor for the trail. The corridor was built for massive freight trains—it can fit a small, quiet light rail (or buses, or any number of other possibilities).

Dan Dion

Santa Cruz

PHOTO CONTEST WINNER

Submit to ph****@*******es.sc. Include information (location, etc.) and your name. Photos may be cropped. Preferably, photos should be 4 inches by 4 inches and minimum 250dpi.

GOOD IDEA

FLOWER POWER

“Enchanting Gardens in the Mountains” will allow visitors to tour through seven magical gardens in Bonny Doon on Sunday, June 10. Tickets are $20, available for purchase at Valley Churches United, Scarborough Gardens, San Lorenzo Garden Center, the Garden Company, and Mountain Feed and Farm Supply. Proceeds will go to Valley Churches United to provide services to those in need. Gourmet lunches are available for $12. To reserve a lunch in advance call 831-336-8098. For more information, visit vcum.org.

GOOD WORK

SHINING A LIGHT

Paul Eastman, owner of the Skylight Place in Capitola, has been recognized as one of the most promising remodeling professionals in the nation. Every year, through its “Forty Under 40 Awards Program,” the editorial staff of Pro Remodeler magazine recognizes young and promising industry professionals. The magazine honored Eastman for embracing the next generation of more efficient technology. Paul is the second-generation owner of the Skylight Place, which specializes in building and replacing windows and doors.

QUOTE OF THE WEEK

The streets were dark with something more than night.
-Raymond Chandler

What’s your perfect day?

Columns

Matthew Cole Scott

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June 6, 2018

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“Homemade breakfast, journaling, taking in the ocean, time with friends and family, something creative like music, meditation and yoga. ”

Aaron Clegg

Santa Cruz

Teacher

“Connect with my children, find a good recipe, and then share it with somebody I haven’t met before.”

Frank Cohen

Campbell

Software Developer

“Drive up Highway 1 with friends and a tent and different CDs, having fun and getting to know each other, and at the end of the night camp and enjoy the sunset.”

Kathia Damian

Santa Cruz

Barista

“Enjoying something outside, and doing something active where your adrenaline is pumping, and then finishing off the day with something relaxing like reading a book or going to the movies and a glass of wine.”

Emma McLaren

Santa Cruz

Sustainable Seafood Consultant

“I’d like to do something with friends and then have a family activity. Maybe travel somewhere foreign. Then I’d wrap it up with some chocolate and dancing.”

Adriana Lugo

Santa Cruz

Teacher Librarian

Lifting the Earth to the Kingdoms of Beauty: Risa’s Stars June 6-12

Risa D’Angeles

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June 6, 2018

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Lifting the Earth to the Kingdoms of Beauty: Risa’s Stars June 6-12

Now that the forces (Restoration, Enlightenment, Reconstruction) invoked during the Three Spring Festival (Aries, Taurus, Gemini) have precipitated into the Earth, the New Group of World Servers (NGWS) is being asked by the Hierarchy to make plans for their distribution in order that humanity is aided and uplifted. We remind ourselves that Restoration, Enlightenment and Reconstruction must begin within and wherever we find ourselves.

While under the influence of Gemini, mutable (fluid) air (intelligence) sign, humanity encounters much talk, reason, new ideas, revelatory and illuminating. Under Gemini and Mercury, we are asked to choose how we will speak with each other. Our communications can create separations among and with each other, continuing a grave polarity in our country. Or our communications can create harmony in thought, words and speech which uplift the vital fluids, allowing for drops of blessings to stream forth upon everyone. These are Jupiter’s blessings (Ray 2 of Love/Wisdom and Gemini’s Ray).

Under Gemini, Mercury and Venus, with harmony of communication, we help
“uplift the Earth to the Kingdoms of Beauty.” Gemini asks us this question: “Why do reason, logic and truth seem to play a diminished role in our private and public discourses?”

ARIES: How is your communication network at home and with neighbors? Do you need a new phone (with no static?), computer upgrade, more reliable technology and sources of information? Mercury, the messenger, sitting in your living room, is looking around and assessing just how good your ability is to reach out, have Right Human Relations and make contact. Mercury reminds us that contact releases love.

TAURUS: You will be communicating on a higher more spiritual level. It’s already begun and if you observe yourself each day, notice you’re reading, speaking, teaching, thinking, planning, focusing your ideals and opinions, and sending out important messages in all directions. Though it’s unusual for this to occur, it’s greatly needed for the elimination of all illusions and distortions concerning the truth (which isn’t relative at all).

GEMINI: The themes to ponder are values, resources and money … themes, yes, that have been mentioned before. And with the retro next they’ll continue and deepen. It’s good to answer the following questions; 1) How are your finances? 2) What are your resources? 3) What’s of value to you? 4) Are you of value? 5) How and why? Write by hand the answers in your esoteric journal.

CANCER: It’s a good idea, a healthy one, to begin a consistent exercise program carried out each day at the same hour. You might find yourself more excitable and nervous than usual. Exercise calms and diminishes these difficulties, focusing your mental abilities through daily planning. When asked “What is mine to do this day?” Your answer is “exercise.” Keep moving.

LEO: Many internal realities are occurring in the form of thoughts, ideas, revelations, aspirations and plans. In several months some of them will enter form and matter. Is the past presently taking up much of your thinking? Are you missing someone or thinking of people no longer in your life? Speaking with them is still possible. Visualize a line of light from your Soul to theirs. Meet them at the center of Light. Both hearts then open.

VIRGO: It’s good to ponder upon what your ideals, expectations and goals in life are. Are these ideals and goals from your heart or the heart and mind of another? It’s good also to consider what your ethics and principles are, and what integrity means to you? In terms of principles, in the Aquarian Age there are three principles we are to abide by. Do you know what they are?

LIBRA: Have your worldly plans worked out as expected? Has your daily life improved? For career advancement it’s good to gain a greater mastery in something you’re interested in. What would that be? All communications at work assume vital importance now. Careful not to make anything too complicated—from foods to exercise to expectations of others’ behaviors. Expectations create disappointments.

SCORPIO: You seek the mysteries of life, the larger view of life and to know the puzzle of how all the complicated various parts fit together. Culture, art, religions (especially), the law, geography, journeys, pilgrimages, the plains, horses, and various philosophies call to you. The question always is what to choose? Do travel here and there, out and about. You need new exposure, new vistas to explore.

SAGITTARIUS: Enter deeply into conversations beyond the self. Allow communication to deepen, so you can think and feel and be serious with someone. Allow it to be intellectual, philosophical and psychological (but not political). Allow the encounter (you and the other) to change your ways of thinking. You could discuss the interesting subject of death. What are your thoughts on death? Do you know what the Bardos are?

CAPRICORN: Always come from the heart with those close to you. When speaking with family ask them to listen and not respond. Unless you want responses. Later, ask questions and allow dialogue to flow, back and forth, among everyone. It’s good to have others’ perspectives. At this time you also need beauty around you. Stand in a field of flowers. Stay within the nature, the most balanced kingdom. It teaches us harmony.

AQUARIUS: Wherever you are, seek fun and friendship. Don’t have an attitude of competitiveness or expectations that you will be first. The planets are pulling you back and inward these days. The energies allowed are those of rest, relaxation, laughter, ease, all things comfortable and uncomplicated. If the experiences don’t support this, step back into the shadows and observe. Love holds you.

PISCES: Express your deepest thoughts and feelings. Write them down. When possible, communicate to others your wants and needs. If no one’s listening, enter the information into your esoteric journal. Draw what you want and need. This is a very creative time. The arts—seeing them, reading about them, visiting museums, ballets, symphonies, botanical gardens, etc.—will strengthen your heart, which at times seems sad these days. Maintain prayer and visualizations.

Rob Brezsny’s Astrology June 6-12

Rob Brezsny

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June 6, 2018

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Free Will Astrology for the week of June 6, 2018

ARIES (March 21-April 19): According to my analysis of the astrological omens, you would be wise to ruffle and revise your relationship with time. It would be healthy for you to gain more freedom from its relentless demands; to declare at least some independence from its oppressive hold on you; to elude its push to impinge on every move you make. Here’s a ritual you could do to spur your imagination: Smash a timepiece. I mean that literally. Go to the store and invest $20 in a hammer and alarm clock. Take them home and vociferously apply the hammer to the clock in a holy gesture of pure, righteous chastisement. Who knows? This bold protest might trigger some novel ideas about how to slip free from the imperatives of time for a few stolen hours each week.

TAURUS (April 20-May 20): Promise me that you won’t disrespect, demean, or neglect your precious body in the coming weeks. Promise me that you will treat it with tender compassion and thoughtful nurturing. Give it deep breaths, pure water, healthy and delicious food, sweet sleep, enjoyable exercise, and reverential sex. Such veneration is always recommended, of course—but it’s especially crucial for you to attend to this noble work during the next four weeks. It’s time to renew and revitalize your commitment to your soft warm animal self.

GEMINI (May 21-June 20): Between 1967 and 1973, NASA used a series of Saturn V rockets to deliver six groups of American astronauts to the moon. Each massive vehicle weighed about 6.5 million pounds. The initial thrust required to launch it was tremendous. Gas mileage was seven inches per gallon. Only later, after the rocket flew farther from the grip of Earth’s gravity, did the fuel economy improve. I’m guessing that in your own life, you may be experiencing something like that seven-inches-per-gallon feeling right now. But I guarantee you won’t have to push this hard for long.

CANCER (June 21-July 22): Mars, the planet that rules animal vitality and instinctual enthusiasm, will cruise through your astrological House of Synergy for much of the next five months. That’s why I’ve concluded that between now and mid-November, your experience of togetherness can and should reach peak expression. Do you want intimacy to be robust and intense, sometimes bordering on rambunctious? It will be if you want it to be. Adventures in collaboration will invite you to wander out to the frontiers of your understanding about how relationships work best.

LEO (July 23-Aug. 22): Which astrological sign laughs hardest and longest and most frequently? I’m inclined to speculate that Sagittarius deserves the crown, with Leo and Gemini fighting it out for second place. But having said that, I suspect that in the coming weeks you Leos could rocket to the top of the chart, vaulting past Sagittarians. Not only are you likely to find everything funnier than usual; I bet you will also encounter more than the usual number of authentically humorous and amusing experiences. (P.S.: I hope you won’t cling too fiercely to your dignity, because that would interfere with your full enjoyment of the cathartic cosmic gift.)

VIRGO (Aug. 23-Sept. 22): According to my analysis of the astrological omens, a little extra egotism might be healthy for you right now. A surge of super-confidence would boost your competence; it would also fine-tune your physical well-being and attract an opportunity that might not otherwise find its way to you. So, for example, consider the possibility of renting a billboard on which you put a giant photo of yourself with a tally of your accomplishments and a list of your demands. The cosmos and I won’t have any problem with you bragging more than usual or asking for more goodies than you’re usually content with.

LIBRA (Sept. 23-Oct. 22): The coming weeks will be a favorable time for happy endings to sad stories, and for the emergence of efficient solutions to convoluted riddles. I bet it will also be a phase when you can perform some seemingly clumsy magic that dispatches a batch of awkward karma. Hooray! Hallelujah! Praise Goo! But now listen to my admonition, Libra: The coming weeks won’t be a good time to toss and turn in your bed all night long thinking about what you might have done differently in the month of May. Honor the past by letting it go.

SCORPIO (Oct. 23-Nov. 21): “Dear Dr. Astrology: In the past four weeks, I have washed all 18 of my underpants four times. Without exception, every single time, each item has been inside-out at the end of the wash cycle. This is despite the fact that most of them were not inside-out when I threw them in the machine. Does this weird anomaly have some astrological explanation? – Upside-Down Scorpio.” Dear Scorpio: Yes. Lately your planetary omens have been rife with reversals, inversions, flip-flops, and switchovers. Your underpants situation is a symptom of the bigger forces at work. Don’t worry about those bigger forces, though. Ultimately, I think you’ll be glad for the renewal that will emerge from the various turnabouts.

SAGITTARIUS (Nov. 22-Dec. 21): As I sat down to meditate on your horoscope, a hummingbird flew in my open window. Scrambling to herd it safely back outside, I knocked my iPad on the floor, which somehow caused it to open a link to a Youtube video of an episode of the TV game show Wheel of Fortune where the hostess Vanna White, garbed in a long red gown, revealed that the word puzzle solution was USE IT OR LOSE IT. So what does this omen mean? Maybe this: You’ll be surprised by a more-or-less delightful interruption that compels you to realize that you had better start taking greater advantage of a gift or blessing that you’ve been lazy or slow to capitalize on.

CAPRICORN (Dec. 22-Jan. 19): You’re in a phase when you’ll be smart to bring more light and liveliness into the work you do. To spur your efforts, I offer the following provocations. 1. “When I work, I relax. Doing nothing makes me tired.” – Pablo Picasso. 2. “Opportunities are usually disguised as hard work, so most people don’t recognize them.” – Ann Landers. 3. “Pleasure in the job puts perfection in the work.” – Aristotle. 4. “Creativity is allowing yourself to make mistakes. Art is knowing which ones to keep.” – Scott Adams. 5. “Working hard and working smart can sometimes be two different things.” – Byron Dorgan. 6. “Don’t stay in bed unless you can make money in bed.” – George Burns. 7. “Thunder is good, thunder is impressive; but it is lightning that does the work.” – Mark Twain.

AQUARIUS (Jan. 20-Feb. 18): “There isn’t enough of anything as long as we live,” said poet and short-story writer Raymond Carver. “But at intervals a sweetness appears and, given a chance, prevails.” My reading of the astrological omens suggests that the current phase of your cycle is one of those intervals, Aquarius. In light of this grace period, I have some advice for you, courtesy of author Anne Lamott: “You weren’t born a person of cringe and contraction. You were born as energy, as life, made of the same stuff as stars, blossoms, breezes. You learned contraction to survive, but that was then.” Surrender to the sweetness, dear Aquarius.

PISCES (Feb. 19-March 20): Between you and your potential new power spot is an imaginary ten-foot-high, electrified fence. It’s composed of your least charitable thoughts about yourself and your rigid beliefs about what’s impossible for you to accomplish. Is there anything you can do to deal with this inconvenient illusion? I recommend that you call on Mickey Rat, the cartoon superhero in your dreams who knows the difference between destructive destruction and creative destruction. Maybe as he demonstrates how enjoyable it could be to tear down the fence, you’ll be inspired to join in the fun.

Homework: Confess your deepest secrets to yourself. Say them out loud when no one but you is listening. Testify at Freewillastrology.com.

Good TimesGood Times

Good TimesGood Times

EDITOR’S NOTE

LETTERS TO THE EDITOR

PHOTO CONTEST WINNER

GOOD IDEA

GOOD WORK

QUOTE OF THE WEEK

Aaron Clegg

Santa Cruz

Teacher

Frank Cohen

Campbell

Software Developer

Kathia Damian

Santa Cruz

Barista

Emma McLaren

Santa Cruz

Sustainable Seafood Consultant

Adriana Lugo

Santa Cruz

Teacher Librarian