Interesting People
Self Help
“I was a young girl who never felt comfortable in her skin or content in my body,” Jesse Bennett says. “I was good at being positive and caring to others, but I wasn’t kind to myself.”
“When I started practicing Pilates and yoga in college, it was a gamechanger,” she continues. “I fell in love with how the practices changed how I felt in my skin. I want to give that gift to other people, to empower women to love who they are and where they’re at.”
End Of An Era
As a kid, I spent many hours at the Crocker Art Museum. Between school trips and weekend jaunts with my artist parents, I wandered the halls finding favorite paintings and artifacts.
One constant was the presence of Lial Jones, the Crocker’s Mort and Marcy Friedman director and CEO. Deeply kind despite an imposing presence, Jones would greet us with a smile. I was star-struck, knowing she ran the place.
Now Jones is retiring. In January, she leaves a 25-year Crocker legacy that could fill volumes.
Under Jones, the collection grew by 23,000 objects, attendance and membership doubled, and programming expanded. She oversaw the tripling of the Crocker’s physical footprint with the addition of the Teel Family Pavilion.
Risk Averse
One recent afternoon, I stood in a Midtown workout studio called Her Elevated, dressed for movement with other women. We were learning to defend ourselves.
I was ready to throw some punches. But when instructor Lisa Thew, owner of self-defense training company Diamond Defense, started the class, I was handed a binder and asked to sit on a couch.
For the next hour, Thew took the group through lessons in risk assessment and awareness that form the basis of Rape Aggression Defense.
Voices Unlocked
If there’s one thing Kamika Hebbert knows it’s this: “It doesn’t matter what you come from, you can be the change. Don’t let your negative circumstances be your outcome.”
She could be speaking about herself. Hebbert grew up between foster care and her biological family. Many of her relatives were incarcerated. At age 9, she started writing letters to family members behind bars to provide them with an emotional connection, care packages and even financial support.
Kids’ Stuff
The SMUD Museum of Science and Curiosity is busy with field trips, learning labs, planetarium shows and other activities to inspire students toward careers in science, technology, engineering, arts and math.
Last school year, 24,000 students visited the museum. Executive Director Andrea A. Durham expects more this year. In its mission to build interest in science, Durham says serving as role models is the most important work for museum staff.
“Students don’t pick careers they don’t have any exposure to,” she says. “So, when you ask a 4-year-old what they want to be, there’s a reason they say a policeman or a firefighter or a teacher, because those are they careers they see in their life.”
Design Minded
It’s not often a high-end retail store moves from the Bay Area to the Sacramento area. But the village of Fair Oaks is the new home to Terrestra, a destination for handcrafted home accessories.
After establishing locations in San Francisco and Mill Valley, Terrestra co-founders Amy Satran and Ray Kristof decided to downsize and move their gallery closer to the Sacramento home they purchased six years ago.
Satran and Kristof are a tech couple with backgrounds in multi-media. They met decades ago at Apple and started Terrestra in 2003. Today they consider themselves semi-retired in Fair Oaks Village while overseeing the gallery.
“Amy and I have always been collectors, and I grew up in France and enjoyed it from an early age,” Kristof says.
