IWALLK: A Living Magazine - Tap Root: Days 83 to 85 - Farmington Aesthetics--Buildings and Architecture

Thirty years ago I was a freshman college student at UMF (University of Southern Maine). Way back then I had a brand new appreciation for Maine architecture. That last spring I had just completed a Maine Architecture elective course for my senior year in high school with a great teacher who truly inspired me to stop and look at the little details in buildings and houses instead of just driving by them.

I was fortunate enough to be attending my first year of college in such a singular place as Farmington, Maine. And, I did genuinely appreciate my many short walks between the university buildings, and also my strolls into the downtown area.

A friend of mine recently well-expressed the unique character of this rural town as being "the only coastal town to be located in the Maine countryside." I thought that was a great way to put it. You just don't see the clean, classic buildings and wide variety of businesses that Farmington contains in other rural Maine towns. It is so much more characteristic of the Maine Midcoast region (Wiscasset to Bar Harbor).

Now, mix in Farmington's 2017 cosmopolitan student population, whose Millennial generation of dyed-hair, tattooed, heavily pierced, diversely dressed, LGBT and straight young adults happily roaming the streets and stores, with not the slightest sense of negative self-consciousness. Yes, they still have the same fears and shaky desires to fit in that all late teens and early twenty-somethings have dealt with, but in today's world it is so much less about appearance than when I took classes here. And, thank God.

While high school may have prejudiced these young people - in the towns all around the nation, where they grew up and had to face their parents' social, political and religious biases at home - college life, and being immersed in a student population filled with people who are utterly different from their secondary school experience, does a very good job of resetting ideology. They feel free to adopt new ideas without the hometown scrutiny and circumscribed peer pressure they have now left at home. At least that is what happened to me, here, three decades ago.

As I write here at Dunkin Donuts in the middle of town, I observe that the girls who are into conforming to more socially "girly" fashion - with its highly sexualized forms of dress--super-short shorts, tight-fitting one piece dresses, open midriff halters and carefully-ripped jeans, etc. - are now hanging out with the "emo-girls" with pierced noses, shoulder length straight black hair, pink stockings and white or black lipstick, etc. And, both groups seem emulsified by the middling girls who are more comfortable in their LLBean sweaters, modest jackets, looser jeans and other clothes that are always acceptable (the same kind of slightly-unisex, ivy league-like, New England clothes that I grew up with and still gravitate toward).

Interestingly, all girls in this age group seem to have "stretch pants day" when a memo alert must be texted to all iPhone users? Maybe it is weekend fashion or something? Perhaps someone from that age group will clue me in? Anyhow, black stretch pants apparently cross all aesthetic boundaries. For a man about to turn 50 years old, it sometimes appears as though these pants are more like painted-on versions of skinny jeans. I guess I am showing my age when I think some things were once better left to the imagination.

As for the young men I see? Most seem to be more like high school freshman than college students. They seem far less interested in romantic encounters than with hanging out together and enjoying their other common interests. These interests appear to be centered around maintaining a kind of neonatal permanence. What I mean by this is that men of this age group see no need to abandon their skateboards and video games. They openly express their innermost feelings and insecurities with each other.

And, this brings me to the conversations I overhear. But... I am not going to get into these very fascinating subjects in this post. It can wait. It is worth the wait.

What I do wonder about is whether Liberal Arts and the study of high quality English language literature, art history, philosophy, world history and, yes, classical architecture are appreciated before entering college these days? For me, the introduction of cultural subjects of this kind was raised to scholarly heights when I got a chance to be treated like an adult in college, rather than have my creative dreams continuously smashed in my hometown school system.

I guess the above tangents come gravitationally circling back to why it is so nice in the middle years of life to re-inhabit this town where my first cultural mind expansion really took hold three decades ago.

With my walking into town nearly every day, I have had a new way to appreciate what I had first seen here as a young, undeservedly-arrogant, know-it-all kid. It is a great blessing to overlay my impressions from those long ago days upon my much more experienced older self. It isn't just a visual paradigm that inspires me to start what this occasional series I am calling "Farmington Aesthetics." This brief first post under that heading will introduce my inexplicable aesthetic senses in the only way I can initially approach these things.

I intend to transition from my material observations into the deeper and less apparent aspects of this unusual place called, Farmington, Maine. It is worth examining the dense mixture of cultural assumptions and unexpected happenings that make this town a one of a kind Maine experience. I have found progressivity imbedded in one of the most traditional and conservative areas of Maine; a village of farmers and blue collar sensibility, where it can also safely be claimed that an anything goes attitude is allowed to prosper. Today though, let's start with the traditional buildings.

To start, here are the houses located along my Middle Street walk into town...

A gorgeous glassed in porch.

A three story Victorian.

One version of "the New Englander" style of house--often varieties of this are found

in the multi-unit Maine apartments of the major cities. The characteristics include a door

on one side of the major section. Often there is a bay window (but not in this case).

A favorite smaller house, with permanent Christmas lights in the windows.

Another much more elaborate New Englander with impeccable paint job.

Neat and clean house that appears to have once been a bit more disheveled.

Love the in-ground garage. This house has one of the prettiest side yards in town...

...See the little running by the apple tree in the back.

Here is the New Englander with the bay window. I would have chosen a different color scheme

than the mustard hues, but the painted detail is quite intricate.

Another small but pretty house. I like how they have left most of the yard in a natural state.

All of the above houses are typical of every street in this town. Finally, Middle Street gives way to High Street and the edge of the UMF campus...

The fabulously beautiful and interestingly designed Farmington Public Library.

Taking a left and walking east along High Street we see the typical squared off red brick and
white wooden buildings of the UMF campus...

Purington Hall dorm.

The UMF Student Center, home of the best college meals on the East Coast of America.

When I was going to school here we would have steak night once per week and a lobster bake

during the last week of school. They have a salad bar 20 feet long. My band played here in the

spring of 1988. Activist groups set up tables and booths in the lobby, so there is always something

culturally interesting for students to explore.

The UMF Art Gallery.

Behind Ricker Hall.

And, here it is--Scott Hall dorm, South (left) and North (right), connected by the lounge.

My room was in Scott North, on the top floor, third set of windows back--Room 308.

In my time it was a "smoking room." Today the whole campus is smoke free.

In that room the most profound experience of my life took place. It is part of the amazing

story that I hope to be writing up for you this winter. This semi-supernatural occurrence negatively affected everything that happened to me in the last thirty years. It is something that I intend to face again and finally come to terms with. I must end the spell or there may be no more story.......