Q: My husband and I attended his niece’s wedding two years ago. Our gift was money to pay for their honeymoon. We were miffed we never got a thank-you note. We recently got a note that they’re expecting their first child. We sent a card but no gift, as we never got any response for our wedding gift. Yesterday, a card came in the mail, thanking us for our generous gift and telling us about their honeymoon. We suspect they’re realizing that wedding guests who didn’t get thank-you notes are holding back on gift-giving for the baby. Should we buy them a baby gift, or should this be a time for tough love?—Resentful

A: Sounds like you’ve discovered the gift-seeking couple version of the dude who stops returning a woman’s texts, only to resurface weeks later at booty o’clock—texting the 12:31am “Hey, whatchu doin’?”

Understandably, you and your husband weren’t hot to go unthanked for another extravagant gift. Your reticence to fork over again to the unappreciative duo has a long history, stemming from the evolutionary need to distinguish cooperators from freeloaders. Ancestral humans who let themselves get ripped off had less access to resources, making them more likely to wind up genetic dead ends.

We humans evolved to have a built-in drive for reciprocity. Our emotions are reciprocity’s worker bees, putting out feelbad emotions when we get scammed. We’re motivated to rid ourselves of those rotten feelings, which we do by trying to right the balance or avoid getting scammed again.

That said, in close relationships, we aren’t looking for 50/50 reciprocity like in business. In this case, a 55-cent first-class stamp on a thank you card would’ve done the job.

In other words, you’re ultimately reacting to a lack of gratitude—an emotion more vital to human connection than it gets credit for. Gratitude (in response to somebody’s generosity) is an important display of what evolutionary psychologist Julian Lim and his colleagues call “social valuation”: how much another person values our well-being. Their showing high valuation of our interests is ultimately a form of social insurance—a sign that when the chips are down, they’re more likely to be there for us.

When people don’t seem to value our well-being highly enough, we get angry—as you two did. I wrote in a recent column, referencing the work of evolutionary psychologist Aaron Sell, that anger is a “recalibrational emotion”: an emotion that evolved to influence our own behavior as well as someone else’s. Anger does its work through imposing costs and/or withdrawing benefits.

Complicating matters, parents of some or many millennials haven’t hammered them on the importance of thank-you notes the way parents (and grandparents) did with previous generations. Also, many millennials view writing messages in ink on paper and putting them in the mail as an exotic ancient practice, like paying cash or having a CD collection.

Granted, in this instance, you don’t say you required a thank-you on monogrammed card stock. You were just looking for a little acknowledgment, a little connection with the newlyweds, like a texted picture or two from their honeymoon, maybe with a “Thanks for this awesome love-cation.” That’s not unreasonable.

But to view these two more charitably, you might want to consider the effects of millennial culture. Culture is, simply put, what lots of people in a group do. Cultural attitudes are contagious, meaning they spread from person to person. In other words, the millennial cultural environment may contribute to good and kind nieces and their new husbands shrugging off rituals important to human psychology and coming off as rotten little ingrates.

Consider that they did ultimately end up thanking you—albeit belatedly. Taking the cynical view, maybe they just wanted baby loot. But if you believe they may have learned their lesson, you might be inspired to take a chance—splurge on that crib with the attached day spa, the Tesla of baby strollers, or robo-siblings to tide the kid over until Mommy and Daddy make human ones for him to blame and terrorize.

Steven Kent was 13 years old when he met Elvis Presley backstage after a show in Las Vegas. “The whole experience was a bit of a blur, but the buzz around Elvis was like nothing I’d ever seen before,” says the Healdsburg resident, who grew up in Mill Valley and Sausalito. “People were pushing cameras in his face, everyone wanted something from him, and I remember thinking, ‘This’ll make a person crazy eventually.’”

Years later, Kent and former–Spreckels Performing Arts Center Manager Gene Abravaya discussed creating a Country Western–themed benefit event for Spreckels during a chance meeting. Kent described an idea he’d kicked around of doing a concert-style show featuring the songs of Presley and Johnny Cash—who Kent also met.

“I told Gene I was thinking about calling the show ‘Cash & King,’ and that it would weave the greatest songs of Presley and Cash around stories of their lives, and a bit about what they’ve meant to me over the course of my life,” Kent says.

The resulting show was a huge success, packing Spreckels’ main theater. What Kent conceived as a one-time-only night of fun turned into a side-career when he fielded offers to take the show on the road.

“We’ve gone on to do it all over the Western states, in Oregon, Nevada, Arizona; but we haven’t done it again in Sonoma County for a while,” he says.

That changes at 7pm on Sunday, Nov. 3, when Spreckels Performing Arts Center brings Cash & King back to the stage where it all began.

“We’ve put together a great band, and we put on big show filled with some of the best songs ever written,” Kent says. “And we’re excited to be back at Spreckels.”

But back to the thing about meeting Cash.

“I lived a lot of places, and I had a band in L.A., once, and I hung out at The Palomino,” Kent says. “I met a guy named Earl Ball, a piano player, who worked in my band from time to time—when he wasn’t touring with Johnny Cash. He was Johnny Cash’s piano player!”

Over the years, Kent frequently told Ball how much he’d love to meet Cash—some day.

“After several years, I went to see Cash perform at Knott’s Berry Farm,” Kent says. “After the show, I saw Earl, and he grinned at me and said, ‘Turn around.’ And there was Johnny Cash, standing right behind me. My legs almost buckled. I’ve seen a lot of famous people in my life, but I’ve never been around anybody who had the charisma or gave off the excitement I felt from being around Johnny Cash and Elvis Presley.”

Speaking of Presley, Kent still remembers his chat with the King back when he was 13.

“I told him, ‘I’m a singer, and I want to be just like you,” says Kent. “Elvis stopped me and said, ‘No, no. Always be yourself.’ I’ve remembered that to this day.”

Cash & King plays Sunday, Nov. 3, at Spreckels Performing Arts Center, 5409 Snyder Lane, Rohnert Park. 7pm. $30–$40. 707.588.3400.

ARIES (March 21-April 19): Do you have any skills in fulfilling the wishes and answering the prayers of your allies? Have you developed a capacity to tune in to what people want, even when they themselves aren’t sure of what they want? Do you sometimes have a knack for offering just the right gesture at the right time to help people do what they haven’t been able to do under their own power? If you possess any of those aptitudes, now is an excellent time to put them in play. More than usual, you are needed as a catalyst, a transformer, an inspirational influence. Halloween costume suggestion: angel, fairy godmother, genie, benefactor.

TAURUS (April 20-May 20): Author Amy Tan describes the magic moment when her muse appears and takes command: “I sense a subtle shift, a nudge to move over, and everything cracks open, the writing is freed, the language is full, resources are plentiful, ideas pour forth, and to be frank, some of these ideas surprise me. It seems as though the universe is my friend and is helping me write, its hand over mine.” Even if you’re not a creative artist, Taurus, I suspect you’ll be offered intense visitations from a muse in the coming days. If you make yourself alert for and receptive to these potential blessings, you’ll feel like you’re being guided and fueled by a higher power. Halloween costume suggestion: your muse.

GEMINI (May 21-June 20): More than a century ago, author Anton Chekhov wrote, “If many remedies are prescribed for an illness, you may be certain that the illness has no cure.” Decades later, I wrote, “If you’re frantically trying to heal yourself with a random flurry of half-assed remedies, you’ll never cure what ails you. But if you sit still in a safe place and ask your inner genius to identify the one or two things you need to do to heal, you will find the cure.” Halloween costume suggestion: physician, nurse, shaman, healer.

CANCER (June 21-July 22): Cancerian artist Marc Chagall (1887–1985) was a playful visionary and a pioneer of modernism. He appealed to sophisticates despite being described as a dreamy, eccentric outsider who invented his own visual language. In the 1950s, Picasso observed that Chagall was one of the only painters who “understood what color really is.” In 2017, one of Chagall’s paintings sold for $28.5 million. What was the secret to his success? “If I create from the heart, nearly everything works,” he testified. “If from the head, almost nothing.” Your current assignment, Cancerian, is to authorize your heart to rule everything you do. Halloween costume suggestion: a heart.

LEO (July 23-Aug. 22): The Dead Sea, on the border of Jordan and Israel, is far saltier than the ocean. No fish or frogs live in it. But here and there on the lake’s bottom are springs that exude fresh water. They support large, diverse communities of microbes. It’s hard for divers to get down there and study the life forms, though. The water’s so saline, they tend to float. So they carry 90 pounds of ballast that enables them to sink to the sea floor. I urge you to get inspired by all this, Leo. What would be the metaphorical equivalent for you of descending into the lower depths so as to research unexplored sources of vitality and excitement? Halloween costume suggestions: diver, spelunker, archaeologist.

VIRGO (Aug. 23-Sept. 22): “We have stripped all things of their mystery and luminosity,” lamented psychologist Carl Jung. “Nothing is holy any longer.” In accordance with current astrological omens, Virgo, your assignment is to rebel against that mournful state of affairs. I hope you will devote some of your fine intelligence to restoring mystery and luminosity to the world in which you dwell. I hope you will find and create holiness that’s worthy of your reverence and awe. Halloween costume suggestion: mage, priestess, poet, enchantrix, witch, alchemist, sacramentalist.

LIBRA (Sept. 23-Oct. 22): “One language is never enough,” says a Pashto proverb. How could it be, right? Each language has a specific structure and a finite vocabulary that limit its power to describe and understand the world. I think the same is true for religion: one is never enough. Why confine yourself to a single set of theories about spiritual matters when more will enable you to enlarge and deepen your perspective? With this in mind, Libra, I invite you to regard November as “One Is Never Enough Month” for you. Assume you need more of everything. Halloween costume suggestion: a bilingual Jewish Santa Claus; a pagan Sufi Buddha who intones prayers in three different languages.

SCORPIO (Oct. 23-Nov. 21): In his novel Zone One, Scorpio author Colson Whitehead writes, “A monster is a person who has stopped pretending.” He means it in the worst sense possible: the emergence of the ugly beast who had been hiding behind social niceties. But I’m going to twist his meme for my own purposes. I propose that when you stop pretending and shed fake politeness, you may indeed resemble an ugly monster—but only temporarily. After the suppressed stuff gets free rein to yammer, it will relax and recede—and you will feel so cleansed and relieved that you’ll naturally be able to express more of your monumental beauty. Halloween costume suggestion: your beautiful, fully exorcised monster.

SAGITTARIUS (Nov. 22-Dec. 21): “I am glad that I paid so little attention to good advice,” testified poet Edna St. Vincent Millay. “Had I abided by it, I might have been saved from some of my most valuable mistakes.” This is excellent advice for you. I suspect you’re in the midst of either committing or learning from a valuable mistake. It’s best if you don’t interrupt yourself! Halloween costume suggestion: the personification or embodiment of your valuable mistake.

CAPRICORN (Dec. 22-Jan. 19): Cleopatra was an ancient Egyptian queen who ruled for 21 years. She was probably a Capricorn. All you need to know about her modern reputation is that Kim Kardashian portrayed her as a sultry seductress in a photo spread in a fashion magazine. But the facts are that Cleopatra was a well-educated, multilingual political leader with strategic cunning. Among her many skills were poetry, philosophy and mathematics. I propose we make the REAL Cleopatra your role model. Now is an excellent time to correct people’s misunderstandings about you—and show people who you truly are. Halloween costume suggestion: your actual, authentic self.

AQUARIUS (Jan. 20-Feb. 18): Around the 11th hour of the 11th day of the 11th month, the 11th sign of the zodiac, Aquarius, will be capable of strenuous feats; will have the power to achieve a success that surpasses past successes; will be authorized to attempt a brave act of transcendence that renders a long-standing limitation irrelevant. As for the 11 days and 11 hours before that magic hour, the 11th sign of the zodiac will be smart to engage in fierce meditation and thorough preparation for the magic hour. And as for the 11 days and 11 hours afterward, the 11th sign should expend all possible effort to capitalize on the semi-miraculous breakthrough. Halloween costume suggestion: 11.

PISCES (Feb. 19-March 20): Author Robert Musil made a surprising declaration: “A number of flawed individuals can often add up to a brilliant social unit.” I propose we make that one of your mottos for the coming months. I think you have the potential to be a flawed-but-inspiring individual who’ll serve as a dynamic force in assembling and nurturing a brilliant social unit. So let me ask you: what would be your dream-come-true of a brilliant social unit that is a fertile influence on you and everyone else in the unit? Halloween costume suggestion: ringleader, mastermind, orchestrator or general.