It's obvious from the last post that I used to watch a lot of TV and some of those shows and other aspects of pop culture had inspired my fashion tastes. What I somehow forgot to mention is another profound inspiration with my fashion sense: my Mother. Perhaps I didn't want to get over-emotional in the first post, but she was a strong influence on me, to say the least. I say "was" as she passed away in 2006 from a 5 year struggle with cancer. My Mom was a strong role model to me, in fact, I considered her my best friend. Some teens would try to strongly rip away from their parents when they became a certain age, but I wasn't really like that; I was proud to be around my Mom and have such a strong bond with her.
My Mom took the first Fashion course offered at Sheridan College and was in the first graduating class too. As far as I know, Sheridan no longer has a Fashion course as part of their program lineup. She was always being creative, and even had a little sewing room set up just for her downstairs in our house.
My Mom did a lot of cool projects for a lot of people. She often made our Halloween costumes, sometimes made outfits for me for picture day out of tablecloths...though at the time I didn't appreciate the hard work that went into such a thing. She made home furnishings for friends, often asking for very little from them (the friend's discount as some call it) but the finished product always looked amazing! Her sewing skills were fantastic and she had such a kind, giving spirit. If I could only be half the woman she was, I'd be a very happy person. She never fully stopped making clothing, as she once made me an elaborate Renaissance gown in my teen years for a Halloween party and upon completion vowed to never again make such an elaborate thing for me. In her later years she had a strong passion for home decor and commenced redoing everything in our house. She seemed to be highly interested in reupholstering furniture and had even made the couch and pillows she is sitting on in this picture of her I provided below.
She found out she had breast cancer right around my 20th birthday, right at the same time my Grandma had informed my Mom that my Grandpa suffered a stroke. My Mom didn't want to worry my Grandma, so she didn't tell her about her cancer news she just received immediately. I can't recall if she took weeks or days to tell her, either way it seemed like an eternity to me, as they spoke on the phone ever day.
When I finally went off to college, I made a decision to go to a place to be close by to them in case they needed me. I took Fine Arts at Georgian College in Barrie, figuring it was closer than the other program that accepted me. My first year of school I learned Printmaking, among other mediums, so I had dipped into the art of silk-screening. Though my teacher didn't like one simplistic image I created, my Mom did, and we both saw the potential for the design on fabric, like shirts, bags, etc. We actually decided to come up with our own little company of reversible tote bags. My Mom and I teamed up to design them together. On one side the fabric was a solid colour, stripe, or polka dot, and on the other side was a denim (sometimes dyed in a unique colour if the customer preferred) and a pocket that had a silk-screened print by me with some kind of quirky character on it. It was the perfect size for beach bags or diaper bags, and people seemed to love them! We even got our bags into a local store. We called ourselves "Ragz Bagz"which we thought was cute, given that our last name was Ragozzino. I made a website, and helped Mom do other things as she sewed most of the bags together. I also was working two jobs that summer on top of doing this side hustle with my Mom, so we were very busy to say the least.
I went back to school for a few more years, and had sort of abandoned the idea of Ragz Bagz but it was in the back of both of our minds I'm sure. My Mom had survived Chemotherapy twice, and often kept a positive outlook until one day, she broke down in my room as I was moving into a new place. She had tried to be brave and hold it together for me and couldn't do it anymore. I asked her what was wrong, and she told me the cancer had spread to different parts of her body and they weren't able to cure it. She was going to have it for the rest of her life. I don't know if I was naive or just plain stubborn, but I told her it's ok, she's Super Mom, and she just needs to stay positive to get through this, like she has been doing all along. By this point in time I had already graduated from school after 3 years and was going into a 4th year, but after hearing this news I worried about her constantly, to the point where my grades were suffering and I was seeing a school counselor for someone to talk to. I had spoken to my counselor about dropping out nearing the end of the semester. She was wondering when I was going to make that decision, and made it so that semester didn't really exist. I just worked and paid whatever bills I had until I heard the call that mom didn't have much time left. She told my brothers and I that she wanted us to do anything we wanted to do in life and I definitely took that to heart. I'm so grateful I had a Mom that was as encouraging and as brave as she was and pushed us to pursue our dreams. I don't know who I would be without her. For a long time I tried to let fashion be Mom's thing, I ignored my hidden passion for it so I didn't step on any toes, but eventually I realized how much I loved it too, through all of my adventures prior, a lot of arrows pointed me towards this direction. Some of the classic fabric patterns I draw inspiration from were things my mom had in her sewing cabinet. Her creativity shines through, it's very hard to douse the flame of her strong influence, I am forever proud to be her daughter.
