Twenty years ago, when eclectic roots-rock duo Gypsy Soul was just starting out, husband-and-wife collaborators Roman Morykit and Cilette Swann moved to San Anselmo after a record deal in Los Angeles went south.
“All was going well [in Los Angeles],” Swann says. “We were charting on the Top 40, everything seemed great, and [the label] ran out of money.”
British-born Morykit, an accomplished multi-instrumental musician, and Canadian-American Swann, a famed jazz singer and lyricist, decided then and there to pursue their musical aspirations independently.
“There are a lot of connections to Marin and northern California for us,” Morykit says. “It’s really where Gypsy Soul was born.”
In the last 20 years, the duo has self-released 13 well-received albums that cross the boundaries between jazz, soul, acoustic pop and melodic folk. “We’ve found a niche without support from labels, where people are connecting with what we do,” says Swann. “That’s been the greatest thing along the way.”
To celebrate their 20th anniversary as Gypsy Soul, the duo recently released two compilation albums on their website, with remixed and remastered versions of songs from their past releases. Currently living in southern Oregon, Gypsy Soul returns to Marin with a holiday concert, called “A Gift Within The Song,” featuring soulful medleys that mix together reworked holiday songs with pop covers, fan favorites and other surprises.
“There’s too much saccharin sweet in the versions I remember as a kid,” Morykit says, “so we really rearranged these things.”
“It creates a lot of audience engagement because they don’t know what’s going to happen next,” Swann adds. “We try to make it innovative and make it entertaining for people.”
Like little boys and marriages, theater productions are rarely all bad, or all good. To illustrate, depending on one’s point of view there are at least two ways of looking at Shakespeare in Love, the stage version of the 1998 film, currently in performance at Mill Valley’s Marin Theatre Company (MTC).
THE CASE FOR: This adaptation of the popular film has a lot going for it. First, its illustrious provenance. The original Academy Award-winning screenplay on which it is based was co-written by a pair of respected veterans of the entertainment world: Marc Norman, who has worked extensively in TV, films, radio and live theater, and the internationally known playwright Tom Stoppard, who has a similar background. The transfer to theater (which closely follows the original) is by Lee Hall, whose impressive biography includes many successful adaptations and original scripts. It’s hard to beat that combination.
Second, while making no claims to be historically accurate, the play conforms with our imagination’s view of what the lively, competition-driven theater world of Elizabethan London might have been like. Wheeling and dealing are common, along with treachery, lechery and occasional violence, as promoters and performers struggle for survival. Meanwhile, the monarchy and its upper-class supporters enjoy a life of festive balls and banquets against a background of sprightly music of the period (performed by the actors). All of these are vividly depicted in MTC’s production, directed with a sure hand by Jasson Minadakis.
Third, its 35 characters—some historical, others fictional—offer juicy rewards for the versatile and talented 13-member cast, many of whom double or triple to fill the roles. Among the most prominent: L. Peter Callender brings his stentorian voice and commanding presence to Richard Burbage, the leading actor of his time; Stacy Ross is a formidable Queen Elizabeth; Mark Anderson Phillips is the avaricious money lender, Fennyman, who makes everyone’s lives miserable. As for the others, there isn’t a weak member of the ensemble, which includes a little white dog named Spot, who steals every scene he pokes his tiny nose into.
Finally, the play’s central narrative, an account of how Shakespeare (Adam Magill), then a footloose gallant pursuing the ladies, overcomes a severe writer’s block after his success with Two Gentlemen of Verona, by falling in love with Viola de Lesseps (Megan Trout), a fictional aspiring actress who became his muse. Her inventors speculate that this romance not only fostered his composition of the masterful Romeo and Juliet, but began the process of breaking the prohibition against female performers on stage. According to them, the emotional burst of energy that young Will experienced while wooing her inspired some of Romeo and Juliet’s most beautiful passages—including the famous balcony scene and the pair’s tragic death in the Capulet’s tomb—both of which are presented in the play, along with quotes from other works, as a reminder of just how much of a genius the author really was.
THE CASE AGAINST: While the strength of MTC’s production is probably indisputable, research shows that both the film and play have had a mixed critical response. Ben Brantley’s New York Times review (July 23, 2014) of the London premiere typifies the skeptics’ view. To quote: “(The play) may be best described as Shakespeare-flavored, in the way that some soft drinks are advertised as fruit-flavored … ” He then goes on to bemoan what he calls the “twee factor”—too cute and precious for its own good, citing Spot’s gratuitous appearance as one example.
Another objection that might be raised, especially during this period of increased sensitivity about male/female relationships, is Shakespeare’s casual treatment of the women in his life (until he meets Viola), including a wife whom he left to fend for herself and their children in Stratford while he frolicked among London’s ladies. As morals change, the talented playboy image is definitely no longer a fashionable icon.
Whatever the merits of these arguments, I think they miss the main point. Shakespeare in Love was never intended to be a realistic account of the famous author’s early days. It’s a completely fictional story that fills in gaps in what remains unknown about its subject with material that the authors hope will be entertaining. On that level, the play is a clear winner. Case closed.
NOW PLAYING: Shakespeare in Love runs through December 23 at Marin Theatre Company, 397 Miller Ave., Mill Valley; 415/388-5208; marintheatre.org.
With the holidays officially upon us, here are some tasty ways to celebrate the season.
Cavallo Point, which has the most beautiful cooking school in the Bay Area, is offering a Holiday Gifts: Candies & Truffles class on Thursday, December 7 from 6:30-9:30pm. Learn recipes for sweet treats, and take some home for gifts; $85 per person; cavallopoint.com.
Connect with your inner DIY self at Fairfax Backyard Farmer. Part workshop, part retail store, the inviting business offers a roster of classes that includes everything from beer-making to mushroom-foraging. Two classes in December include how to make homemade sourdough and how to make cheese; fairfaxbackyardfarmer.com.
Now in its 11th year, the inspiring Sausalito Gingerbread House Competition & Tour is underway and houses will be on display for the month of December. It’s a good way to get people shopping in Sausalito, but in my mind, Caledonia Street, with its stellar restaurants and the best neighborhood market in Marin (Driver’s), is well worth visiting; sausalitogingerbread.com.
The annual Bolinas Winter Faire at the Bolinas Community Center, Dec. 8-10, offers eggnog, hot apple cider, food and plenty of handmade crafts, jewelry and art from West Marin artists; bocenter.org.
Here are three options that will give friends and family a true taste of Marin: A trek out to Marshall for oysters is always a good idea, but a meal at beautiful Nick’s Cove, right on the water, takes the experience up a few notches (nickscove.com); Bar Bocce in Sausalito serves up tasty sourdough pizzas, beer and wine, and features bocce ball courts—all just a stone’s throw from the bay (barbocce.com); For the best Mediterranean food in Marin, hearty Insalata’s in San Anselmo tops the list (insalatas.com).
It turns out that “Why didn’t you just fix the road?” is a more complicated question than it appears when it comes to Sir Francis Drake Boulevard (the Drake).
Toward the end of last winter, when multiple, wind-lashed rainstorms caused a state-leading $9 million in damage to Marin County roads, a small section of the Drake broke off the renowned roadway, on a winding part of the passage just east of the turnoff to the Platform Bridge Road.
The small chunk of asphalt that fell down the banks of the parallel-running Lagunitas Creek meant that eastbound cars had to veer, ever so slightly, into the westbound lane, to avoid the jagged edge of broken asphalt. Marin County Department of Public Works (DPW) crews were quickly on hand after the partial road failure and installed street signs that warned of “changed conditions ahead.”
A determination was made at the county level that the partial collapse of the road did not rise to the level of an emergency, and therefore, the partial failure was not immediately repaired. An emergency declaration would have meant that the road would be repaired immediately and before all the necessary permits were filed to do the work next to the sensitive and well-tended Lagunitas Creek. The creek enjoys various environmental protections at the local, state and federal levels, mostly owing to the waterway’s status as one of, if not the hardiest coho salmon–hosting creeks in the state.
So they didn’t fix the road. It wasn’t that big of a deal.
Instead, the road breach got a little worse through the spring, and then got a little worse over the summer. Over a period of months, eastbound drivers had to veer just a bit more into the westbound lane to avoid the space where the asphalt had been. By autumn, the Drake had been undermined to such an extent that it effectively rendered that section of the well-travelled route a one-way road. Stop signs were then installed, in recognition that the non-emergency was emerging as something that sure looked like an emergency.
But Marin County Supervisor Dennis Rodoni says that the stop signs were not sufficient to allay DPW fears of a head-on collision at this winding section of road. And so the county just installed a portable traffic-light system, complete with solar panels, along Sir Francis Drake. The Drake is now a one-lane road at this chokepoint, complete with Jersey barricades that protect one of the actual traffic lights from getting hit by a car.
So why didn’t they just fix the road? Well, it’s complicated, says Rodoni, and it’s hard to argue with that. An emergency declaration would have meant that the emergency roadwork would have been undertaken without permits from multiple agencies that have a stake in roads and salmon—state, federal, local agencies all have a hand in the permitting process. Getting the permits after the fact, says Rodoni, is an expensive proposition. More expensive than renting portable traffic lights and letting a non-emergency and slightly damaged road become a heavily damaged actual emergency, for a year?
Yes, he says. The issue is not academic in a region with scant few emergency routes into and out of West Marin, and one key road that’s already been knocked out of commission since the winter.
In the first year of his first term as a Marin County Supervisor, Rodoni acknowledges that the breach on the Drake “has gotten worse month by month.” He and the DPW didn’t expect the road to disintegrate to the extent it has, he says. “We were surprised it got worse in the dry weather.”
The county has been able to get some but not all of the permitting in place to fix the road. “At the end of the day, the constructions costs may be less because of not having an emergency declared and also the cost of the permits. It’s a balancing act.”
The road’s been secured for the winter, Rodoni says, and the portable traffic lights will be there until the repairs are undertaken in the spring. “There is no other alternative at this point,” he says, “but to make sure it stays safe, and maintain the single lane until spring.”
One way to support your community this holiday season is to shop local. We present two designers who make sure that you’ll find something special for your favorite people.
Renee Sheppard
Not to be confused with Chopard, the luxury powerhouse and celebrity darling, Renee Sheppard is a jewelry designer whose flagship store adorns not Rodeo Drive, but rather downtown Larkspur. Sheppard’s designs, however, are not only red carpet-worthy visually, but actually have been worn by Hollywood’s most stylish celebrities, from Elizabeth Olsen and Hilary Duff to Jessica Biel.
Sheppard, who lives in Ross and grew up predominantly in Mill Valley, was selling to stores all over the country and online before becoming a ‘local’ store in May of 2016. “Originally, I just built a following and sold my jewelry throughout the country, and it really became popular in the fashion industry,” she says. The reason, according to Sheppard, that the jewelry was so well-received in the fashion community is because it’s designed with a style angle in mind, rather than the traditional aesthetic. “It has an edgier feeling, especially since I started mixing pavé diamonds with precious stones to make it more everyday,” Sheppard adds.
Since opening her flagship boutique on Magnolia Avenue, Sheppard has established it as a hub of wellness and relaxed luxury, mixing high-end jewelry with a freshly added selection of healing serums, relaxing soaks, supplement dusts by the Los Angeles-based health guru Moon Juice, fragrant candles and other pampering products made by small, independent brands from California and beyond.
“I’ve been wanting to go on a path of healing since running into some health issues, so everything I put in my body is natural and organic,” she says, “so this inner-beauty-and-outer-glow-oriented line of products is a natural development for the store, a part of my personal journey.”
The jewelry, first launched in 2010 online, shines the brightest; Sheppard’s signature handwriting is all about the angular, minimalistic and geometry-inspired, with a wild, earthy side added to a number of pieces. While some designs are triangular, rectangular and clear-cut, others take cues from medieval and astrological symbols; earrings are shaped like stars, a trendy ‘open’ ring, hugging the finger, can feature a fleur-de-lis motif or trace the shape of a crown. Some designs—inspired by her travels to Sweden, Mexico and Hawaii—range from regal and elegant to beachy and nonchalant. All pieces, according to Sheppard, can fit any age group and occasion.
“I’m not a jeweler; I’m an interior designer initially and a branding expert,” she says. “I translated those skills into designing jewelry, and it’s produced in India, San Francisco and New York.”
Playing with black and white pavé diamonds, oxidized sterling silver, gold and natural stone beads, Sheppard is balancing trends and classics; being a mother to a teenage daughter clearly plays out in some of the looks, which, in turn, are favored by young stars on the red carpet. Other items, like cascading rose gold necklaces and look-at-me statement earrings, are more than fitting for a night out or a benefit. There’s also an option for custom-designed jewelry for special occasions and once-in-a-lifetime celebrations. Sheppard produces around three collections a year, emphasizing the timelessness of a piece.
In addition to her own designs, Sheppard’s boutique often features other talented jewelry-makers, turning the spotlight to talented female makers like Larkspur-based Ashley Morgan and Tura Sugden; both designers share the brand’s delicate, fresh aesthetic and fit in nicely with the boutique’s selection and reserved decor, and Morgan also does the custom orders—bridal and repurposing stones from family heirlooms. Speaking of fitting in, the boutique is not only a jewelry shopping destination, but also a community gathering spot; friends and customers are often featured on Sheppard’s Instagram account, and the store hosts champagne toasts, trunk shows, exhibitions by local artists and the occasional party, during which shopping, mingling and networking intertwine.
“It’s new to me, being local,” Sheppard says. “It allows me to be more connected to individual clients, and being in the store myself is very fulfilling. It’s been a really wonderful transition.”
To make things even more wonderful, Sheppard is doing a number of exciting holiday promotions: 15 percent off for the eight days of Hanukkah, and 40 percent off three days before Christmas. Right in time to get your bling on.
Textile and clothing designer Lesley Evers spent a good portion of her childhood in the Bay Area; she was born in Oakland to Berkeley-native parents, and, while the family moved to North Carolina before she could finish grade school, Evers came back after attending University of Pennsylvania, where she studied architecture and art history.
While she never went to fashion school, and started sewing as a hobby, Evers’ penchant for the artistic shines through her designs, which are currently sold in two stores; the flagship location in Oakland and the newer addition—the bright and welcoming boutique in Corte Madera’s Town Center. Previous to dedicating herself to style, Evers was a painter; her husband Curtis, who isn’t a stranger to patterned pants and cool hats, is a maker, and a frequent collaborator on the brand’s photoshoots. Evers often models her designs herself, equipped with a light attitude and a sense of humor.
“Since starting my business in 2008, I’ve sold to over 100 boutiques across the country and even had a department store account,” she says. “Ultimately I decided I prefer to sell directly, opened my first store and stopped selling wholesale.”
She never regretted it. Talking to women, receiving feedback and finding the right outfit for the right customer has been Evers’ favorite thing ever since, aside from the creative process. “I like to do my own textiles, inspired by ’50s and ’60s prints,” she says. “In my late 30s I couldn’t find the pretty dresses I wanted to wear, so I just started a business, of comfortable printed cotton dresses.”
At the relatively new boutique, which adds understated charm to Corte Madera’s high-end appeal, customers find a range of easy-to-wear, casual pieces with a fun-loving, colorful twist; flattering embroidered pants (“I think you will treasure these and find your own favorite way to wear them,” Evers advises on her website), cozy wrap dresses in grey and
Textile and clothing designer Lesley Evers often chooses to model her own designs; this scarf is one of her creations. Photo courtesy of Lesley Evers.
black, printed tunics and sweaters and a holiday-friendly selection of sparklier, more festive attire. The clothes may be designed and produced in Oakland, but the vibe is very much Marin County—elegant yet comfortable, and bursting with individuality.
“We’re very pleased that Lesley Evers will open at Town Center as the location for her first Marin County store,” Town Center Corte Madera General Manager Stan Hoffman was quoted when the boutique first opened in 2015. “Her casual styles and unique designs will be well received with our Town Center customers.” He was on point; for the last two years, the boutique has been thriving among its chain store neighbors, building a loyal customer base.
“My business partner Janine Rogers lives in Kentfield and really wanted to open in Marin, and I loved that it’s driving distance, and I can visit the boutique a lot, so Janine is really managing it,” Evers says. When Evers visits the area, she likes to go to the beach or visit a local friend, “but really, I’m so busy with my business,” she adds.
Being a mother to two teenagers, as well as a pet mother to a large dog, Evers favors clothes that one can move freely in. To make a point, if it’s not her showcasing the clothes on her website and Instagram, it’s her friends; shopping, attending a wedding, working and having fun on the weekends. This is all a part of the #LErealwomenProject that Evers launched, aiming to showcase her designs on busy, active, interesting women she likes and admires. There’s local plastic surgeon Dr. Karen Horton, real estate agent Caroline Nelson and even prominent Bay Area writer Ayelet Waldman and Oakland Mayor Libby Schaaf.
“At the risk of totally irritating my friends, sometimes I just ask my photographer to pop by for photos when we’re going out,” Evers writes on her blog. “Merging my personal life and work life is the only way to get everything done.” The models, says Evers, weren’t a representation of her customer base. So she did an open call, “and over 50 women came. We put everyone on our website.”
Lesley Evers, 211 Corte Madera Town Center, Corte Madera; 415/924-2340; lesleyevers.com.
ARIES (March 21-April 19): I hope that everything doesn’t come too easily for you in the coming weeks. I’m worried that you will meet with no obstructions and face no challenges. And that wouldn’t be good. It might weaken your willpower and cause your puzzle-solving skills to atrophy. Let me add a small caveat, however. It’s also true that right about now you deserve a whoosh of slack. I’d love for you to be able to relax and enjoy your well-deserved rewards. But on the other hand, I know that you will soon receive an opportunity to boost yourself up to an even higher level of excellence and accomplishment. I want to be sure that when it comes, you are at peak strength and alertness.
TAURUS (April 20-May 20): You were born with the potential to give the world specific gifts—benefits and blessings that are unique to you. One of those gifts has been slow in developing. You’ve never been ready to confidently offer it in its fullness. In fact, if you have tried to bestow it in the past, it may have caused problems. But the good news is that in the coming months, this gift will finally be ripe. You’ll know how to deal crisply with the interesting responsibilities it asks you to take on. Here’s your homework: Get clear about what this gift is and what you will have to do to offer it in its fullness.
GEMINI (May 21-June 20): Happy Unbirthday, Gemini! You’re halfway between your last birthday and your next. That means you’re free to experiment with being different from who you have imagined yourself to be and who other people expect you to be. Here are inspirational quotes to help you celebrate: 1. “Those who cannot change their minds cannot change anything.”—George Bernard Shaw. 2. “Like all weak men he laid an exaggerated stress on not changing one’s mind.”—W. Somerset Maugham. 3. “A foolish consistency is the hobgoblin of little minds. With consistency a great soul has simply nothing to do.”—Ralph Waldo Emerson. 4. “The snake which cannot cast its skin has to die. As well the minds which are prevented from changing their opinions; they cease to be mind.”—Friedrich Nietzsche.
CANCER (June 21-July 22): I suggest that you take a piece of paper and write down a list of your biggest fears. Then call on the magical force within you that is bigger and smarter than your fears. Ask your deep sources of wisdom for the poised courage you need to keep those scary fantasies in their proper place. And what is their proper place? Not as the masters of your destiny, not as controlling agents that prevent you from living lustily, but rather as helpful guides that keep you from taking foolish risks.
LEO (July 23-Aug. 22): In his book Life: The Odds, Gregory Baer says that the odds you will marry a millionaire are not good: 215-to-1. They’re 60,000-to-1 that you’ll wed royalty and 88,000-to-1 that you’ll date a model. After analyzing your astrological omens for the coming months, I suspect that your chances of achieving these feats will be even lower than usual. That’s because you’re far more likely to cultivate synergetic and symbiotic relationships with people who enrich your soul and stimulate your imagination, but don’t necessarily pump up your ego. Instead of models and millionaires, you’re likely to connect with practical idealists, energetic creators and emotionally intelligent people who’ve done work to transmute their own darkness.
VIRGO (Aug. 23-Sept. 22): What might you do to take better care of yourself in 2018, Virgo? According to my reading of the astrological omens, this will be a fertile meditation for you to keep revisiting. Here’s a good place to start: Consider the possibility that you have a lot to learn about what makes your body operate at peak efficiency and what keeps your soul humming along with the sense that your life is interesting. Here’s another crucial task: Intensify your love for yourself. With that as a driving force, you’ll be led to discover the actions necessary to supercharge your health. P.S. Now is an ideal time to get this project underway.
LIBRA (Sept. 23-Oct. 22): Here are themes that I suggest you specialize in during the coming weeks: 1. How to gossip in ways that don’t diminish and damage your social network, but rather foster and enhance it. 2. How to be in three places at once without committing the mistake of being nowhere at all. 3. How to express precisely what you mean without losing your attractive mysteriousness. 4. How to be nosy and brash for fun and profit. 5. How to unite and harmonize the parts of yourself and your life that have been at odds with each other.
SCORPIO (Oct. 23-Nov. 21): I predict that in the coming months you won’t feel compulsions to set your adversaries’ hair on fire. You won’t fantasize about robbing banks to raise the funds you need, nor will you be tempted to worship the devil. And the news just gets better. I expect that the amount of self-sabotage you commit will be close to zero. The monsters under your bed will go on a long sabbatical. Any lame excuses that you have used in the past to justify bad behavior will melt away. And you’ll mostly avoid indulging in bouts of irrational and unwarranted anger. In conclusion, Scorpio, your life should be pretty evil-free for quite some time. What will you do with this prolonged outburst of grace? Use it wisely!
SAGITTARIUS (Nov. 22-Dec. 21): “What is love?” asks philosopher Richard Smoley. “It’s come to have a greeting-card quality,” he mourns. “Half the time ‘loving’ someone is taken to mean nurturing a warmish feeling in the heart for them, which mysteriously evaporates the moment the person has some concrete need or irritates us.” One of your key assignments in the next 10 months will be to purge any aspects of this shrunken and shriveled kind of love that may still be lurking in your beautiful soul. You are primed to cultivate an unprecedented new embodiment of mature, robust love.
CAPRICORN (Dec. 22-Jan. 19): You know that unfinished task you have half-avoided, allowing it to stagnate? Soon you’ll be able to summon the gritty determination required to complete it. I suspect that you’ll also be able to carry out the glorious rebirth you’ve been shy about climaxing. To gather the energy you need, reframe your perspective so that you can feel gratitude for the failure or demise that has made your glorious rebirth necessary and inevitable.
AQUARIUS (Jan. 20-Feb. 18): In an ideal world, your work and your character would speak for themselves. You’d receive exactly the amount of recognition and appreciation you deserve. You wouldn’t have to devote as much intelligence to selling yourself as you did to developing your skills in the first place. But now forget everything I just said. During the next 10 months, I predict that packaging and promoting yourself won’t be so #$@&%*! important. Your work and character WILL speak for themselves with more vigor and clarity than they have before.
PISCES (Feb. 19-March 20): There used to be a booth at a Santa Cruz flea market called “Joseph Campbell’s Love Child.” It was named after the mythological scholar who wrote the book The Hero with a Thousand Faces. The booth’s proprietor sold items that spurred one’s “heroic journey,” like talismans made to order, herbs that stimulated courage and mini-books with personalized advice based on one’s horoscope. “Chaos-Tamers” were also for sale. They were magic spells designed to help people manage the messes that crop up in one’s everyday routine while pursuing a heroic quest. Given the current astrological omens, Pisces, you would benefit from a place that sold items like these. Since none exists, do the next best thing: Aggressively drum up all of the help and inspiration you need. You can and should be well-supported as you follow your dreams on your hero’s journey.
Homework: What change have you prepared yourself to embrace? What lesson are you ripe to master? Write: FreeWillAstrology.com.
Q: I’m a 35-year-old woman. I’m living with my boyfriend, who’s a freelance artist (talented but just getting started). We’ve been together for three years, and I am paying for pretty much everything. I don’t feel resentful. I feel like we’re a team and eventually his career will take off. However, my parents keep saying it’s a bad dynamic: I’m coddling him, and he’s taking advantage of me.—Worried
A: Ideally, when one partner is the sole breadwinner, the other is the stay-at-home parent to more than two rambunctious goldfish. There’s a term in risk researcher and former derivatives trader Nassim Nicholas Taleb’s books—“skin in the game.” That’s what’s missing when, say, a hedge fund honcho advises you to make some big-bucks investment. If he’s guessed right, he’ll share in your profits. However, any losses are all yours.
“Skin in the game” is also what’s missing from your boyfriend’s end of the relationship. You’re doing all of the work to keep the roof over the relationship. Your boyfriend’s doing none of the work but reaping 100 percent of the benefits. Such a gross asymmetry in effort may be creating a breeding ground for laziness. In fact, by making things so easy for him, you may be making it harder for him to succeed.
The fact that you’re a woman who’s paying for everything may make this more of a problem. Women evolved to seek “providers,” and men coevolved to expect that. Men’s self-worth is also driven by their ability to provide. So though many couples think they “should” be OK with a woman as the sole or primary moneymaker (because … equality!), it often leads to resentment in the woman and emasculation in the man.
Finally, consider whether you reallyaren’tOK with this Vincent van No Job arrangement but are going along with it because you think it’s the good-girlfriend thing to do. It’s OK—and probably good for your relationship—to ask your boyfriend to put “skin in the game.” People value and feel more a part of something they have to work for—and not just by opening all of the bills before handing them over for the wage slave girlfriend to pay.
Q: I’m a 28-year-old gay guy. I like to travel and go out and do stuff on the weekends. My boyfriend prefers to smoke pot and uhh … time travel on the couch. He’s a good person, and I love him, but he’s unwilling to cut back on his pot smoking. Friends tell me to dump him, but we’ve been together for three years, and bailing now would mean throwing that time away.—Frustrated
A: The guy isn’t without ambition. He tries really hard every day to give the cat a contact high. There’s a point when love seems like “the answer”—when you’re 14 and practicing your make-out skills on your pillow. But then you grow up and get into a relationship with a man you love, and you find yourself packing for Bali while he’s packing his bong. Presumably, you’ve tried to come to some compromise. It helps to be specific about what would work for you—like by proposing that he come down from Weed Mountain to spend Saturday afternoon and evening out on the town with you. If he’s unwilling to be enough of a boyfriend to make you happy, well, you have a decision to make.
In making it, don’t let yourself get tripped up by “the sunk cost effect.” This is decision researcher Hal Arkes’ term for our (irrational) “tendency to continue an endeavor once an investment in money, effort or time has been made.” But that initial investment—for example, the three years you’ve already put into your relationship with James Bong—is gone. What makes sense is looking at whether the “endeavor” will pay off in the future, say, in a willingness by your boyfriend to combine his favorite hobby and yours. As travel writer Rick Steves put it, “I have used cannabis all over the world.” (Hmm … then again, so have other people, and they’re still in jail in Turkey.)
This week in the Pacific Sun, our cover story, ‘Cultural Treasure,’ highlights downtown San Rafael’s recent designation as a cultural arts district by the California Arts Council. On top of that, we’ve got a grab-bag of news, a piece on Sausalito’s waterfront Joinery, a story about the timelessness of ‘Winnie-the-Pooh’ and an interview with songwriter Corey Smith. All that and more on stands and online today!
A person can be composed of a set of perfectly good facial features and still be basically ugly, and that’s the case with Mildred (Frances McDormand) in Three Billboards Outside Ebbing, Missouri. Short hair tied up with a bandanna, dressed in coveralls as if she worked at a Jiffy Lube instead of an Ozarks gift shop, Mildred has a sudden inspiration to harass the police force in her town. Seven months previously, her daughter was raped and burned to death, and no one has been arrested yet. She decides to tell the police chief off through a set of billboards. This embarrasses the terminally ill Andy Griffith-like chief (Woody Harrelson) revered in the town because (or in spite of) the local police’s reputation as torturers of black prisoners. Dixon, his assistant—a drunk and sometimes vicious Barney Fife, well-played by Sam Rockwell—is far more angry.
Through her bereavement, Mildred has a license to spit venom. It’s a role that runs a small gamut. There are little nuggets of surprise embedded in the monotony of her forcefulness. It is a powerful part: Kicking kids in the balls, throwing firebombs, maiming a dentist and usually having the last word.
One moment of tenderness has Mildred addressing a deer, telling it and the audience that she doesn’t believe it’s a reincarnation of her lost daughter. Yet there is the deer—we’ve seen the symbol of hope, and director/writer Martin McDonagh (In Bruges) gets it both ways.
The surroundings are all rural loveliness, soaked in Carter Burwell’s score. Caleb Landry Jones, of Byzantium, is a relief from the ambient overheatedness as a self-amused billboard salesman. Harrelson is at his most benign as the police chief, even if McDonagh is at his roughest when he tries to write tenderly.
Contemporary country music songwriter Corey Smith was born in Jefferson, Georgia, and his roots in the small town have been a huge part of his musical success. “It’s an important place to me; it’s home,” Smith says. “I never felt too inclined to leave.”
An independent performer and prolific musician, Smith has 10 well-received albums to his name, and is currently wrapping up production on his forthcoming record, The Great Wide Underground. On Sunday, December 3, he’ll perform at Sweetwater Music Hall.
Throughout his career, Smith says that he’s valued creative freedom over the allure of Nashville skylines, and his self-reliant nature is reflected in catchy and heartfelt songs that connect with fans for their relatable intimacy and distinct sense of place.“I’ve chosen to do things the hard way, perhaps because I’m stubborn,” says Smith.
Today’s corporate country-rock songwriting model, especially in Nashville, is writing by committee, with content that’s influenced by label execs, managers and producers. “Having fame and fortune never appealed to me,” he says.
“So much of commercial music, in particular in country, is just telling people what they want to hear,” Smith says. “I think that’s contrary to what art is supposed to be. Art is supposed to be someone internalizing their experience in the world and trying to turn it into something that they can put out there. It either resonates or it doesn’t, but it has to be honest.”
The Great Wide Underground reflects both Smith’s exhilaration in visiting new places and the homesickness of missing his family. “I’m excited about several of the songs on the record,” he says, “because they’re very autobiographical and personal to me.”
Twenty years ago, when eclectic roots-rock duo Gypsy Soul was just starting out, husband-and-wife collaborators Roman Morykit and Cilette Swann moved to San Anselmo after a record deal in Los Angeles went south.
“All was going well ,” Swann says. “We were charting on the Top 40, everything seemed great, and ran out of money.”
British-born Morykit, an accomplished multi-instrumental...
Like little boys and marriages, theater productions are rarely all bad, or all good. To illustrate, depending on one’s point of view there are at least two ways of looking at Shakespeare in Love, the stage version of the 1998 film, currently in performance at Mill Valley’s Marin Theatre Company (MTC).
THE CASE FOR: This adaptation of the popular film...
With the holidays officially upon us, here are some tasty ways to celebrate the season.
Cavallo Point, which has the most beautiful cooking school in the Bay Area, is offering a Holiday Gifts: Candies & Truffles class on Thursday, December 7 from 6:30-9:30pm. Learn recipes for sweet treats, and take some home for gifts; $85 per person; cavallopoint.com.
Connect with your...
It turns out that “Why didn’t you just fix the road?” is a more complicated question than it appears when it comes to Sir Francis Drake Boulevard (the Drake).
Toward the end of last winter, when multiple, wind-lashed rainstorms caused a state-leading $9 million in damage to Marin County roads, a small section of the Drake broke off the renowned...
One way to support your community this holiday season is to shop local. We present two designers who make sure that you’ll find something special for your favorite people.
Renee Sheppard
Not to be confused with Chopard, the luxury powerhouse and celebrity darling, Renee Sheppard is a jewelry designer whose flagship store adorns not Rodeo Drive, but rather downtown Larkspur....
ARIES (March 21-April 19): I hope that everything doesn’t come too easily for you in the coming weeks. I’m worried that you will meet with no obstructions and face no challenges. And that wouldn’t be good. It might weaken your willpower and cause your puzzle-solving skills to atrophy. Let me add a small caveat, however. It’s also true that...
Q: I’m a 35-year-old woman. I’m living with my boyfriend, who’s a freelance artist (talented but just getting started). We’ve been together for three years, and I am paying for pretty much everything. I don’t feel resentful. I feel like we’re a team and eventually his career will take off. However, my parents keep saying it’s a bad dynamic:...
This week in the Pacific Sun, our cover story, 'Cultural Treasure,' highlights downtown San Rafael's recent designation as a cultural arts district by the California Arts Council. On top of that, we've got a grab-bag of news, a piece on Sausalito's waterfront Joinery, a story about the timelessness of 'Winnie-the-Pooh' and an interview with songwriter Corey Smith. All that...
A person can be composed of a set of perfectly good facial features and still be basically ugly, and that’s the case with Mildred (Frances McDormand) in Three Billboards Outside Ebbing, Missouri. Short hair tied up with a bandanna, dressed in coveralls as if she worked at a Jiffy Lube instead of an Ozarks gift shop, Mildred has a...
Contemporary country music songwriter Corey Smith was born in Jefferson, Georgia, and his roots in the small town have been a huge part of his musical success. “It’s an important place to me; it’s home,” Smith says. “I never felt too inclined to leave.”
An independent performer and prolific musician, Smith has 10 well-received albums to his name, and is...
