*** We are a fashion company that chooses to remain open in our humanity . This means sometimes we choose to talk about experiences over what's trending, healing over our own marketing. We choose to remain transparent in our ethos to always remain true. To us that means being honest and raw in what we have to say.
There are many blogs out there that explore the ins and outs of fashion, we choose to be a platform to speak about our lives if we choose to. We will be talking a lot about culture, traditions, family trauma, abuse, mother wounds, dealing with death, healing and everything in-between. It might not be the best marketing strategy but that's ok. its as easy as closing the tab on the top right corner of this page if you wish to not read any further .
Thank you for being part of this journey with us. We have held on for close to a decade, sometimes I have no idea how we did it but a lot of my grit comes from my father.. he was a dreamer and this post is dedicated to him.
March 8th, 1994 changed the course of my life forever. I can go on about loosing a parent at 16, but that's not what this is about. Im not certain I remember the emotions that went through me when I saw my father lying there. It was indescribable , the pain was so unbearable that it borderlined a certain numbness you just can't penetrate through . it was so long ago, time does strange things to protect fragile emotions. I knew my life as I knew it was over but I dont think I could fathom just how much. The void of such an immense loss of the one man that had my whole heart would be substantial, it never really goes away but I learnt to survive and survive I did with twist and turns, peaks and valleys. I sit here at 41, my bruises are healing , some have light scabs over them from years of being picked at but here I am..still standing.
I stand because I chose life, mistakes and all, much like my dad. I stand because I believed in the power of music, of friendships, of living for the moment much like him. I stand because through all the great falls, I picked myself up and kept walking. I stand because going the other way was never an option for me.
He never sat me down and told me I could be anything I wanted to be . A man like him didn't need words, I just knew. He understood that life's journey isn't linear and its complexity is what can reveal our authentic strength. His strength lay in his creative genius , his inability to be anything else but himself. He was always Dada, he never swayed with other peoples expectations of him, I don't think he had it in him, neither do I. He struggled with the patriarchal system he was born in to because he was a force that broke all convention, not out of rebellion but because he always chose truth over convenience. That's just the way he lived . He was innocent like that.
I got to have him for only 16 years of my life but he loved me, he wanted to spent every moment he could with my brother and me. It was sometimes exhausting. I think there is a certain part of me that just doesn't have it to love another human much like I loved my father.
He taught me not through words but his actions to always stay true to myself. I look back with no regrets. My life has been one big fat adventure. Ive been a student, a teacher, a friend, a lover and a fighter, and all the contradictions I could possibly be but most of all Ive been me. Thank you for Dada for leading by example.
My falls are less frequent and my rises are swift and easy. Im still following the music. I love you.
*** My father had a way with words. He would send me letters regularly when I was in boarding school. He wrote this letter in Dec 1989. I dont recall seeing it till a few days after he passed when my brother and I looked in his closet in search of any thing that we could hold on to that reminded us of him. His perfume, the shirt that was still hanging over his closet from wearing it a few days earlier. Memories of how he would toss it over the closet for a new one the moment he walked in the door. We kept that piece of clothing there like left it for months. I longed to keep pretending he was still around. It was a struggle to walk near his closet till one day it was time. Time to exhale and choose to move forward , not because I wanted to but because he would have wanted me to.
He had a personal letter for both me and my little brother Ouso. He compared his personality to the nib on his new pen. That was Dada, he found humour in everything .