The Hail Mary Drop Kick Exposé

Daughter of the Revolution Runway: The Main Street Museum,
first home of the White River Arts & Fashion Collective (WRAF)

My mind is rarely quite.

Certain emotional responses with in each of us trigger needs to reach out, and communicate.

I've found my, own need to write and reflect is often delivered to a specific audience of (1),

General Ideas abstract communicate––universal concerns, general ideas, my ‘Hail Mary Drop Kicks.’ This morning’s post is ALL... one of each. (And this is just the beginning folks)

 or more .


And then, there are those soft still moments, allowing this still–––

yet firm appreciate the silence, more and more...

, it seems


trigger

The need


that



needs to reach out and

I do find a still point in acts of creation, usually further down the troth in ‘the’ design process. Aughh... and yes, the machine forth sewing... how it does bring forth that still point... the textiles, smells, the aroma, the act itself a marvelous dance that every oz. of my being is applied. Why were we, as an organization, so reluctant to go back there? I think this is the right question to ask. 

I fear this question is far from rhetorical. I’ve spent the last year charting a value system that I wish to see a non-profit founded upon––specifically to promote Fashion Art/Public Art––and the possibilities those two forces combined could manifest. These ideas have been put to the test, given their ritual run here at the MSM and now have been spit out––like a seed to sprout-up elsewhere––as have I, but un-like Jonna I never asked to be separated from the entrails of this non-profit––yet neither am I casting aspersions––everything has a reason, if you can find it––and really want to.... Yet for this no-fault travesty, I can see how it begun, and yes, it was the election of Donald Trump, herself (and yes, that does need a bit of explaining!)

MSM's Spring Fashion 2016: Looks by Allyce Good (front, center) & Alyssa Couture (back)

There is an art to masculinization, as there is to feminization. In the wrong hands, or applied for the wrong reasons such elements are either taken for granted or misused entirely. If the use of the feminine pro-noun ‘her’ associated w/ one DT causes you discomfort or anxiety--there certainly is enough of that these days to go around, now isn’t there? I should like to write more about this feminism prospective and Trump I've conjured, but I’m not here at this moment to promote this thesis, not quite yet. But let me say this: the pen is mightier than the sword; and not just because it can sign checks--digg it?  (Read: Charles Eisenstein’s writings on the Gift Economy)

However, there is more to say about the DT and how her election to the office directly and indirectly has ousted me from my role as assistant director of the Main Street Museum. Of this thesis I will summarize, briefly. 

The pen is mightier than the sword; and not because it can sign checks--Digg it?

Of the many things one can say I do not lack is vision. Since 2012 this vision has been to bring Educational Outreach Programming to this community, specifically an education far from academic.
This determination is based solely on first hand observation of need within certain "underserved" populations of our community.

One of the first ‘unexpected’ consequences of DT was the backlash that this organization and I, myself, personally experienced--not direct towards--but coming from the most liberal of all factions. This was devastating and soul wrenching and remains completely unexplained other than by some collective/progressive mass hysteria (a positive feminine force of (blind) justice countering the (random feminine) power of creation/destruction––now symbolized by the very weak male identity of DT himself.).

H. Seano Whitecloud's Amazingly Surreal Fashion Art with a Heart & Soul x 4 (2017)

April 4th is the anniversary of the Main Street Museum’s foray into fashion. There is no real reason (for what I see as a travesty) other than the failure of a sustain vision of what once was and the potential of what could be––and for this failure, I, indubitably, see a direct connection to the 2016 presidential elections––and am somewhat bewildered that no one else in my immediate circle sees this connection as i do––but then again, how could they... LOL

So, let me try to explain my reasoning. Understandably, these statements mean little without a proper context, so of my own relationship to the MSM, and this too I will briefly summarize. 

In 1992 the eccentric, David Fairbanks Ford (DFF), opens his home--the abandoned lunch counter, Lena’s Lunch’ on the newly ‘up 'n coming’ S. Main Street here in White River Junction, VT--as an exhibition space an cabinet of curiosity. Fast Forward >> to 1997 when I come into the picture--The Main Street Museum of Art (the ‘of Art’ later formally dropped) had become an Alt. Phenomena in & of itself, so much so, that DFF expressed a desire to incorporate as a non-profit, and at this point I become in action and on paper the MSM’s ‘vice president’––just like Clair Underwood once was. 

In 2005, I assist on yet another start-up, The ‘J.E.W.E.L. School’ (Justified Education With Experiential Learning) later to become ‘Bryant Academy’ (BA) in Claremont and Henniker, NH. In 2008 I leave the MSM and immerse myself full-time in the field of primary and secondary education and see the career path ahead as an academic one (mind you it would be another two years before I would ever press the peddle of a sewing machine). Fast Forward again to August 2012 and everything changes for me when my home in Claremont, NH  is robbed and vandalized--to such an extent that I leave Claremont and return to White River to work full-time once again with DFF & the MSM (Bryant Academy having since closed it’s doors in 2010–via a perfect storm involving state DOE corruption--oh, let me tell you what a joy that was).

Deeply saddened by the closing of BA two years prior, I am overjoyed to bring a new skill set to my new directive of community arts & education. In 2015 we launch the MSM’s first EOP (Educational Outreach Programming)––the Fashion Arts Collective and beginning a year of planning for it’s second EOP--‘Representation Matters’ and in 2016 we are wildly successful with each--and begin planning for a Mural Arts and Visiting Artist Program until in 2017 when it all falls apart (after I might add the largest, and in many, many ways the most successful MSM Fashion Arts event of them all) . If you’re involved with this institution I'm sure you may have your own opinion as to the ‘state of things’ but I see it like this: Those who fear losing everything will risk nothing, while those who have nothing to lose, will bet everything they have again & again & again––until they get it right. 

Those who fear losing anything will take a chance on nothing, while those who have nothing to lose, will bet everything they have, again & again & again--until they get it right. 

I was sure in 2012 that by going all in at the Main Street Museum I was getting it right (and I’m still not entirely  convinced I have not). ‘Stronger Together’ was not simply a campaign slogan as much as it is a philosophy––once which I ascribe to completely. I wonder how many ‘break-ups’ and splintering and failed attempts at very worthy causes you, yourself, have experienced since her majesty DT has taken office? (and for those who see my gender-bending commentary as a derogatory comment towards women, "Yes, to some at first it may seem as such, but trust me, it's not", said the white privileged male).

With out our symbols, or rather without the faith in these symbols, we are nothing. As of Nov 10, 2016––these symbols are now gone––all of them, and some will argue they were all gone well before that––that is if they ever existed at all. So, there ya go, you can finally get a good nights sleep––it's only the total obliteration of our most deeply held 'collective subconscious symbols' (not like it hasn't happened before). So now, considering this dialog how far-out out on this 'collective' limb are you willing to crawl out?  This is the deepest insecurity of them all, because we now do it for ourselves and crate our own––in this shit show (boycott school kids).

Of DFF and the MSM I will never say an unkind or untrue word, as the founder of this institution is long suffering, generous to a fault as well as a man of equal vision. Our visions are just different and now diverge.  My vision is to expand, explore and adapt. While David's (I suspect, you'd have to ask him) wishes to contract, specialize and focus. And all of these goals are worthy to their cause, it’s just that silly ol' meme come to life–––sort of––"this on-profit ain't big enough for the both of us..." and sure maybe 200 years ago the right thing to do would be to duel it out in the streets—but this ain't Back to the Future Part III either... because we both seek the win-win scenario.

To Be Continued...