Crusty Old Diver - 45 Years Under the Sea

Forty-Five Years Under the Sea

By: John Tolmie photos courtesy Dean McCormick

Dean McCormick found himself working weekends at his family-run dive shop in the early 1980s. “My father, Charles Levi McCormick, opened a dive shop back in 1972.” Dean recalls, “He has always lived and breathed diving. His health took a turn for the worse last year but continued to dive until he was eighty-three.” Dean’s father had hoped his son would follow in his footsteps and at sixteen, Dean began working at the family business. “I was really into music at the time and didn’t have an interest in diving, but my dad had a heart to heart with me and convinced me to give it a try.” Dean laughs, “I wanted to be a rockstar, but I figured diving for a living was pretty amazing, so I decided to put down the guitar and began my career in diving.”

Dean became a certified SCUBA instructor in his early twenty’s and taught SCUBA alongside his father in Rocky Point, Long Island. Recreational diving surged in the early 1990s as business boomed for the McCormick’s. With the demand in SCUBA instruction at an all-time high, Dean’s father purchased a building for a new shop to accommodate the sports growing popularity. “The problem was we couldn’t keep up. We had to turn people away.” Dean says, “Pool time was limited because we had to use public facilities. Securing time slots was a huge issue, so my father built a pool right next to our shop.” The aquatic addition took nearly five years to complete due to stringent local permitting. By the time the pool was up and running, 9/11 had recently occurred bringing with it, a recession. “People understandably curbed their travel and destination diving came to a halt which nearly killed our business.” Now burdened with a mortgage on the pool, the McCormick’s decided to offer swimming lessons to the local youth. “One of our acquaintances was a lifelong swimming instructor and she proposed we use the pool for swimming lessons.” Dean exclaims, “We hired her as our aquatics director, brought on a few water safety instructors and it just took off! The response from the community was amazing!” School Of Fish Swim And SCUBA, was born as Dean and his parents enjoyed renewed success becoming Long Islands’ premier swim school.

Diving instruction, swimming lessons, and selling SCUBA gear immersed the family into all things aquatic, yet Dean would soon discover freediving. In his youth, he had seen a movie called The Big Blue, a dramatic account of groundbreaking French breath-hold diver, Jacques Mayol. Dean purchased a pair of freediving fins and began diving on a single breath. “I swam to a rockpile a couple hundred yards from shore.” Dean recalls, “When I did my first drop, I saw striped bass, tautog, and scup on the reef. I love fresh fish, so I bought a speargun and started spearfishing.” Hunting underwater became an obsession for Dean and soon began freediver training. “I had been teaching SCUBA for years so I thought the course would be a breeze.” Dean chuckles, “But the physics of freediving is completely different. The course was challenging, but I passed and soon took an advanced course

where I dove to a hundred fifteen feet!” Dean became proficient at diving on a single breath and decided to add freediving courses to the business. Only four students attended the instructor course and only two graduated as certified Freediving International Instructors. “Our teacher was super particular and pushed us to our limit. But I passed, began teaching students back home in Long Island, and stocked freediving gear at the shop for students.” Says Dean, “I really like wooden spearguns, but couldn’t find a supplier I liked, so I decided to build them myself.”

Winters are downtime for cold water divers and Dean took the opportunity to delve into building spearguns in his workshop. “The first one I made worked and I was proud of it.” Dean says, “I modeled it after other guns being made in the United States, but it was ugly and primitive.” European spearguns, carved from wood, were elegant with aesthetics and function being equally as important. “I studied what was going on overseas and gravitated toward the European designs and began shaping my guns similarly.” Dean uses scraps of exotic wood to build most of his creations. “My friend from high school works at a lumber yard. He brings me remnants of exotic wood, which is super expensive!” Dean exclaims, “The scrap reduces expenses, but more importantly I’m able to repurpose the wood for another use.” Hardwoods such as mahogany, padauk, teak, purpleheart, black wenge, and Sapele are laminated, milled, and curved, creating multicolored spearguns that rival others on the market today. “I make about ten to twelve guns a year, but I don’t make much money on them.” Dean laughs, “However, building spearguns fills two voids. One, it fulfills my creative side since I stopped playing music. It also keeps me busy all winter. I may not be able to dive for a few months but building spearguns keeps me busy until spring when the water warms and the fish return.”

S S zandra None is a force to be reckon with. I’m not just saying that because she is my friend. I have always been impressed by her intelligence, her humor, her courage, her strength, her tenacity, and her talent, which are all revealed in her artwork. None was reared in upstate New York, and put herself through school, earning her first bachelor’s degree in studio art from SUNY Cortland while pursuing a double major in painting and fiber arts. At the time, she was the only student in the fiber arts program. “I wanted to learn weaving and spinning. I loved the history, the None is an accomplished artist, musician, educator old ancient myths and the women that came before me. Historiand mother of four daughters, ages two to fourteen, including cally, in our culture, all weavers and spinners have been women,” one foster child. This is important to note because in between says None. “It’s a lot different than painting. People know what caring for her family, teaching an Advance Placement program a painting is whether it’s good or bad. But how many times have in art to high school students, and finishing her second master’s you walked past a blanket or a rug without considering the many degree in fine art through the Savannah College of Art & Design, generations of women it took to learn how to do that?” she still finds time to paint. But it’s not by choice. She paints The concept of storytelling in how it relates to memory is another because she is compelled to. She paints because her soul demands theme in None’s work. She is keenly interested in how “memories”, it of her. As with everything None has consciously chosen for her true or not, told to us by our families, society and the media, have life, including to empower her girls with a feminist perspective, molded our identity, and how they can become imbued in our one reoccurring theme in her work, words like “no” or “can’t” children. have never been a luxury this 37-year-old could afford.

have become pivot-able as to how I have identified myself? It takes a lot analyzing to ask, is this memory holding me back or pushing me ahead? Is it worth passing on to the next generation? If you live your whole life thinking, I am like this because I was born this way, or that’s the way my mother raised me, you risk missing out on a lot of potential for yourself, and your children, because you are shaping their reality with however you were shaped. So, I think about this transfer of knowledge, and whether it’s helpful or true,” says None.

To examaine this paradigm further, None created a wall hanging woven from thread and strands of her hair. She added a collection of objects found at her family’s home like bolts from her father’s garage, crystals from her mother’s junk drawer, and a tuning peg from her brother’s broken guitar. They represented keepsakes from what otherwise would have been forgotten moments. The relinquishing of her long, auburn hair symbolized the letting go of what society deems as a woman’s ultimate source of beauty.

“The piece was a reflection on identity development and how parts of our experiences stick with us and rub off on others. I felt strongly cutting my hair off one lock at a time during the process of weaving was a powerful way to integrate a conversation about time into the work. Cutting my hair also had powerful signifiers of femininity and self-empowerment, in that hair is so closely tied to sexuality and ideals of beauty. What I looked like to others would change, and what people thought of me once they learned how I acquired this very jagged “hair cut” would also change. But I was giving that hair a new life and identity,” None says. During her schooling and prior, None recorded three albums as a singer

songwriter, two with her former husband, musician Eric Lichter, with whom she had her first child at age twenty-three. Quickly recognizing that playing guitar and making paintings would not pay the bills, None went back to school for a second bachelor’s degree in art education and became a teacher.

“That degree taught me how to structure lessons to teach my students to think like artists and engage in the conversation of art making from a philosophical standpoint rather than from a technical one,” says None.

Throughout her years of teaching, pregnancy, divorce and remarriage, None painted. She spent 15 years studying the female form, painting only nudes, from her imagination or using her body as a resource. As she says, she was driven to better comprehend the age-old tension between the sex object and the matronly figure, between objectification and empowerment, along with exploring the physical changes to own her body brought on by motherhood.

“Having a baby and experiencing your body as now having a function that is not self-serving, (first growing and then nursing another human being), is really far out, if you think about. Obviously, society keeps that duality between sex object and mother separate. But I wanted to learn more about that through my work,” says None.

As None grew with her family, she became interested in documenting her thoughts on memory, motherhood and femininity for her daughters, who are now the main subjects of her large-scale paintings. The images are far from sentimental. They are not typical childhood scenes of cute kids at the beach, for example. The environments they are depicted in don’t make any sense because they are constructed from memory rather than from an actual place and are not bound by the traditional rules governing perspective and lighting. In one regard, this is why they are so intriguing.

“One of the interesting things about motherhood for me is how far apart my kids are spaced and how much your brain develops from age

twenty-three to thirty-five, as in my case. The paintings are about my kids, but they are mostly about me. I am reflecting on this experience of observing them grow, change and interact with the world. While motherhood can be monotonous and at times, soul crushing, it’s an honor and gift to guide a young person. But it’s also giving up a lot the energy you have to grow and develop yourself, so I have to view motherhood as the journey,” says None.

Although finding time to paint is challenging while working full time and raising four girls, None views these perceived constraints as opportunities.

“The biggest thing that ties my kids to my art are the limitations. I do not have luxury of time, space or money. So, if I have wet oils on my palette and somebody starts crying, I have to put it down. That means in those moments when that door opens, you run through it, full speed ahead. I take a lot of risks with my artwork because it’s now or never. I don’t take any moment for granted. If I can be doing something, I am going to be doing something. The payoff is the work. It’s there forever and it’s real,” None says.

In addition to the many things her daughters have taught her, None has learned one very valuable lesson; ice cream solves most problems.

None’s work will be on exhibit at the Fountain Street Gallery in Boston this September. For more information log onto https://szandranone.com.

Take Me Right Back to the Shack Jack!

By Ali Kaufman

I've found the closest thing to a Juke Joint this The establishment has a full bar service and is by holding these monthly blues jams at The side of the Mississippi, and it is right here in cafe menu, at either The Hogs Breath Tavern or Shack. If the crowd at the first one was any Connecticut! The Chicken Shack, located at The Screaming Goat Tap Room. There is an indication, clearly this was a brilliant move on The Farm At Carter Hill is just one of the gifts ATM onsite as well. Peter’s part. to be unwrapped at this eclectic property in Marlborough. The first thing that comes into I made a trip to The Chicken Shack in April to The big barn doors are left open to create view as you approach is the vintage filling catch the first jam put on by The Connecticut greater airflow, there are picnic tables that station that is realistic Blues Society since things allow you to enjoy the music just outside the enough to have folks shut down last year. It was barn, and inside are two levels with table pull up in hopes of exciting to actually have seating allowing for options if you want to gassing up. That is not some live music after so kick back with a group. Most guests adhered going to happen, but long, but this event had to mask wearing unless drinking or eating. what you will fill up on another reason that made The space di-rectly in front of the stage is left is a lot more fun. it special.The evening in- open for dancing, which led to a few couples Owners Mitch and cluded honoring Ed Stack jumping at the chance to cut loose. Hazel have created a for the many years he has family-friendly place devoted to the CTBS as Kevin Barry comes to this venture wearing that provides wide their president and wel- many hats and with a history that makes him open spaces to gather coming Peter Rost, aka perfectly suited to expand on the success the in front of two outdoor River City Slim, stages and inside the to that post as barn known as The Photo by Sandy Roe Ed steps down. Shack. The original Ed’s trademark main house dating back to the 1870s has been full bloom of black hair, topped by transformed into a B&B with six beautifully a cap has been a mainstay at blues appointed rooms that feature all sorts of antiques. events, festivals, and shows across Eve-rywhere you look there is something that the state as he led the society, supmakes you do a double take, from the 1/2 scale porting the genre, musicians, and Corsair resting under a tree to the ducks and venues. No doubt Peter, after being peacocks that roam the property just waiting unanimously voted in by its for you to take their picture. And the goats - members, will take up the reins and you cannot miss the goats - they won’t let you! bring the society forward. One way

venue is already hav-ing. Kevin’s dad owned is Dave Bumback whose Mom is a Goff. The the Nutshell Cafe that held the honor of being family name is synonymous with servicing and Hartford’s oldest bar in operation. When Kevin rebuilding organs since 1940. They count Greg stepped into the “family business,” he brought Allman and Keith Emerson among their illusmusic in, and one of the musicians, Lucky trious clien-tele, past and present. Peterson, became a lifelong friend. Once Mitch brought Kevin on There is so much board, the existing possibility ahead. open mic night got Kevin shared with an upgrade with me his vision for bookings like Duke unique programRobillard, James ming, recording Montgomery, Jeff space, and the abilPitchell, and his old ity to provide a resfriend Lucky Peter- pite for musicians son. Lucky’s ap- to stay on premises pearance was one as part of the bookof the last in the ing. “We would love U.S before he to have the best orpassed just a year gan players in the ago in May of 2020. world here," Kevin Kevin is planning a confidently stated. tribute show com- As the season gets ing up later this Lucky Peterson on guitar un-derway this season which he hopes to record. Kevin is also month, you can look forward to the next CTBS a musician, an organist, and a recording engi- Jam, May 6th, featur-ing special guest Tas Cru neer that could not be more proud of the stellar who captivates his audiences and is poised to collection of instruments that make up the full release his 10th album, Broke Down - Busted backline at The Shack.The Hammond B3 with Up, September 7, 2021. The Farm At Carter Hill two Leslie 122 speakers, is a particular favorite also has a Bike Night scheduled for May 7th as Kevin’s musical partner and lifelong friend and Comedy with Vic DiBitetto on May 15th.

For all the events, information and reservations, please visit Thefarmatcarterhill.com

“The Chicken Shack at The Farm” is the Facebook page that will keep you up to date.

Tascru.com Is where you can find out more about the music, tour, and Blues Alive, educational programs, and workshops that Tas offers to enlighten and impassion youth.