Photo by Amy Groleau or Kelly Gannon
Hello everyone!
This week I continue the saga that is my life in hopes that it shines some light on how I came to create art, the style of my art (Celtic roots, though I don’t necessarily pull from historical references) and the journey that led me to doing my best to make and sell my art, primarily in the form of sterling silver jewelry.
This week is Part 4.
Questions Answered
Where did your artistic journey begin? (Part 4 - the beginning of Highschool)
When I graduated from 8th grade my head was in the clouds. It’s hard to believe that a 13 year old could feel so confident and put together. 8th grade meant being mature and ready for high school. It meant having figured out all the grade school stuff and having it all together. At least, that’s how I recall feeling about it at the time.
Then the stories from friends’ older brothers began to creep in. Stories about getting your head flushed in the toilet by high school seniors to keep you in line. Stories about people smoking in the bathrooms. Stories about drugs in public high schools. Keep in mind that Nancy Reagan, First Lady at the time, was pushing the whole, “Just Say No,” drug policy. Tipper Gore pushed for warning labels on music albums when the music contained curse words or the song lyrics spoke of drugs and alcohol. (I now realize that those labels also screwed up the artistic integrity of the album art, which is sad all on its own because if you go look at music album art from the past, it really can be quite fantastic!)
When I began high school in the fall of 1986 I was pretty nervous. Most first-year students had lockers away from the main locker areas in the rest of the school in a place that became known to us very quickly as, “freshman row.” We were no longer top dogs from our respective schools. On top of that, the high school we went to was a district school, combining five towns of students together. In addition, not all of the kids from 8th grade classes ended up with us at the public school. Some of them were sent to a private Catholic school in Burlington over fears, presumably, of their parents being afraid of “drug problems” in public high schools in the area – meaning the kids drank and smoked pot. Or so the hearsay from friends at the time indicated.
(Many years later I learned that the “rich” kids who went to that private school weren’t smoking pot, they were doing cocaine.)
Imagine. Five schools of partial 8th grade classes combined. Now you have a bunch of 13-year-olds, not only fearful of the stories they had heard from older siblings, they were an incohesive group of kids who had to struggle with getting to know each other as well.
I quickly learned which bathrooms were the “smoking bathrooms” and avoided those. A few kids with older siblings at the same school adapted quickly as their siblings introduced them to existing friends.
In my mind, I heard swirling, swishing water as the background noise the first few weeks. It never became a reality.
My older brother had become something of a legend there. He had done some extra-curricular activities, mainly track and field, and later just cross-country running. (I had pretty much sworn off all athletic activities of the sort due to hostile memories of being forced to attend track meets in the cold and rain.) He had managed to become co-captain of the high school cross-country team and they won the state championship and went on to come in second place in the New England championship.
It was a hard act to follow for someone with zero interest in most sports.
A few teachers went on to ask, “are you Andy’s brother?”
“Yes,” I would say, sometimes muttering it a little. Other times it would come out sounding a bit more nonchalant.
I remember thinking, “I’m not him.”
Some crazy things were happening. I had shaved the sides of my head in a lopsided mohawk-y way. It probably looked more like a mullet, but the back wasn’t long. At least, a mullet without the long hair in the back or a little ponytail.
I had begun to get into punk music; and the Beatles.
I had been hanging out more with friends in Burlington. (Remember the Mater Christi girls?) The fire that had been ignited by The Violent Femmes started to be fueled by the likes of Suicidal Tendencies (1980s), The Dead Kennedys, Anthrax, and D.R.I.
At some point I managed to get hold of a stereo system. I don’t recall if it was a present from my parents for doing something they found encouraging, or if I had managed to save money for it myself. I’m pretty sure they didn’t enjoy it most of the time as I enjoyed blocking out all the other noises in the house with music. Luckily for them, I was furthest away from the main living spaces. At least I played Reggae some of the time.
Ahh yes. Reggae. I began growing my hair out toward the end of, I think it was, my first year? Maybe it was the fall of my second year. Anyway, I grew it out. Some of the teachers made a few jokes. Mostly the ones that had taught or coached my older brother. That’s when I started to really feel rebellious. I began hanging in the AV room and helping out with Dan, Dan the AV man. I don’t actually recall his last name now.
He drove a Volkswagen Karmann Ghia. He was cool in a Vermonter BeatNik sort of way.
At the same time that was happening, I began to really enjoy creative writing as well as black and white photography.
It seems clear to me now that I was trying to figure out who I was, while at the same time also trying to show everyone else that I was my own person. Not my older brother.
Next time:
I touch upon rebellion: how I made it a mission to prove to adults that you can grow longhair and be a misfit and still get good grades. Researching and trying pot (I spent a lot of free time reading) hanging out in the auditorium with some theater folk, the death of my choir ‘career’, a teacher named Mr. Greenwald, ceramics, physics and being the yearbook editor.
News of late
- Generator – working with others and pushing for some new tools.
- Playing around with my digital designs to laser burn some of my designs in oak and maple for earrings and wooden pendants.
- Dropped off some copper sheet at Vermont Awards to do some engraving tests.
- Working with a client to have their successful repair picked up.
In the Works
I began carving a new Fehu amulet mold and dropped off a sheet of copper with Vermont Awards to begin some engraving tests. It’s very exciting. With any luck, I will have some engraved cuff bracelets to begin selling mid-spring. The website work seems to be dragging out, other life circumstances are pulling me in multiple directions right now, for example, car shopping to replace my current vehicle. As with everyone else, it seems that life likes to provide challenges as if to ask, “what will you do with this one?”
Until next time,
Justin