Facing another March X challenge!

February 29th, 2024

“Everyone has now seen that pandemics are another way for the military, intelligence, and public health services to expand their budgets and their power. In 2020, public health, defense, and intelligence agencies weaponized a [Covid-19] pandemic, resulting in unprecedented profits to Big Pharma and the dramatic expansion of the security/surveillance state, including a systemic abandonment of constitutional rights — effectively a coup d’état against liberal democracy globally.”

Robert F Kennedy, Jr / The Wuhan Cover-Up: And the Terrifying Bioweapons Arms Race (Kindle edition, p. 385)
 

I am recovered from an unnamed health ordeal that hit me the day after Christmas and lasted a month before I felt reasonably well. Then another month before I felt like myself. My recent article in Clandestiny will be all I say about it any time soon. So now it’s Leap Day and the eve of another March X. I won’t be recording regular notes about my heightened activity this time. Priorities to be confronted: 1) completing a “legacy collage” commission for a Dominican Sister of Peace: 2) building a greenhouse in the backyard of the Town House; 3) preparations for a new gardening season; 4) physical conditioning to ready myself for a decent bicycling program in 2024. Be seeing you in April!

February 20th, 2024

“NATO, and the plans to morph it into a global police force under UN control, is the reason for all of this (the debate surrounding the Ukraine-Russia War). Europe wants the US to be a vassal after spending itself to death fighting the phantom menace of Putin. Eurobonds are the real story. The rest is just noise.”

Tom Luongo
 

Gloria in excelsis Deo!

December 25th, 2023

The benefit of cropping exercises

December 20th, 2023

“Accepting the familiar is the enemy of seeing… Seeing takes work and patience and concentration and focus otherwise we are always walking around in a fog only seeing what we think we know but not actually seeing anything at all.”
— Cecil Touchon
 

Cropping exercises always offer some insights about internal composition and color relationships. The more I internalize spatial decisions and color judgments, the less reason there is to think about them when I seek spontaneity in pasting ingredients. Please take a look at the entire collection that I call LITTER-ALLY KENTUCKY.

 

Nine Details, LITTER-ALLY KENTUCKY
collage en plein air by J A Dixon
giclée prints of originals are available

December 13th, 2023

“Indeed, it is perhaps the notion of possessiveness that characterizes the fundamental problem of the human being. True freedom involves a kind of self-dispossession, and a letting go of the attachment to the ‘mine-ness’ of one’s actions… We need to be ‘still,’ to empty ourselves of worldly distractions and illusory attachments, to be able to ‘hear’ and come to understand the Word that is eternally communicated by the Father in the ground. In this sense, it is not as though God is absent in us and then becomes present due to some action of ours that we undertake of our own initiative. Rather, for Eckhart, our task as human beings is to come to be able to listen to — and thereby apprehend — the Word that is eternally and always poured out into us.”

Amber Griffioen, on Meister Eckhart, 5/1/23

August 12th, 2023

“We know that for most healthy people, Omicron is nothing more than a cold and for the young is usually a very mild cold and often asymptomatic. To use a gene-therapy-technology-based vaccine with a high-risk profile and uncharacterized long-term effects against a mild variant is the height of scientific ignorance and arrogance. It is time to stop.”

Robert W Malone MD MS, Lies My Gov’t Told Me: And the Better Future Coming (Children’s Health Defense)

July 10th, 2023

“It is a controversial issue. It shouldn’t be. We should be just naturally wanting to save our children but again there’s those out there that want to exploit them….Can we love God’s children more than we fear evil? That’s the challenge here and Americans are up to it and I love it. They hear the sound of freedom because God’s children are no longer for sale.”

Jim Caviezel, 7/6/23

July 5th, 2023

“Like a cancer, this violation of the First Amendment has seeded itself deep within our federal institutions, and these government actors neither believe what they did was wrong nor have any qualms about doing it again.”

Jeff Landry, Louisiana Attorney General, 7/4/23

June 21st, 2023

“I immediately recognized all of the same tactics that have been deployed against me so often over the last three years. The superficial regurgitating of approved narrative, unwillingness to address the actual issues raised, and of course the ‘liberal’ substitution of ad hominem attacks for actual reporting and analysis. This is all driven by the classical fifth generation warfare/PsyOps/propaganda playbook. Have they no shame?”

Robert W Malone MD, 6/20/23
 

June 15th, 2023

“Federal officials, particularly at the Justice Department, must align their conduct to the Bill of Rights. They cannot act in ways that deny due process of law; they cannot take steps to strip defendants of property except in accord with the law, etc. These external legal constraints on their conduct do not mean that these officials, of necessity, must be freed of the meta-constraint of heeding the leadership of the President on pain of facing removal from office and replacement by an official who will obey the President. Put differently, these external legal constraints as applied to the Attorney General do not mean that the Attorney General must be independent of the President. For the President is also bound by the Bill of Rights.
     “The President’s role in the constitutional structure is unique, and the remedies for presidential violations of law of sufficient moment are to be found in impeachment or at the ballot box. No part of the Constitution allows the creation of one or more officials who stand above and outside the President’s unitary authority over the Executive Branch.”

Jeffery B Clark
 

March 28th, 2023

“Many people (and physicians) rely on the CDC and NIH to guide them in healthcare and wellness decisions. It is way past time that these organizations step up to the plate and do their job and stop relying on the unscientific biases of highly influential bureaucrats. That job being to protect the health of the public. Not advancing the interests of the pharmaceutical industry and its shareholders.”

Robert W Malone MD
Lies My Gov’t Told Me: And the Better Future Coming
 

The world without her remains a world full of Mombo.

January 1st, 2023

This past month was dominated by the earthly departure of my mother. The role she played in my becoming an artist and the approach I bring to my practice cannot, and should not, be understated. What a debt I owe to her, and to pay it forward will require that I live as long as she! I might’ve started “giving back” much earlier, if it had been my basic nature. I can be a quick study for most things, but it often takes me far too long to learn the rest, especially when it involves stepping beyond my own creative urge. Her life was a lesson in putting others before self. In order to support her parents’ household in a world at war, she turned down a full scholarship to the same University of Cincinnati that I would eventually attend. Decades later, in a nest recently emptied of seven children, and just as she was about to explore her own personal interests, she followed her family to a remote part of a rural Kentucky county. As a widow, she built an ethical foundation for a land-based legacy that is now set to endure for generations. When she faced a grim medical prognosis that would break the spirit of others, she maintained a zest for life, an obvious concern for how it might affect others, and an astonishing diligence to push back against it. The world of my youth had shouted, “Be cynical, or pessimistic, or both,” but she would always be my reliable source of optimism, like a spring which never dries up. I could’ve become a quitter early on, but she helped me to overcome discouragement born of self-doubt and to fulfill commitments. If something is worth doing, it’s worth doing well. Why not always do your very best? And then you will automatically get better. Along with my siblings, everything was done to provide the care she needed to continue living at home, until it became no longer possible. Those years — what could be mistakenly judged as sacrificial — strengthened our family bond in a way that will last us for the duration. To separate that from my activity as an artist was unnecessary at the time and foolhardy in hindsight. Above and beyond the value of artisanship, she taught me that a creative life without love for others is devoid of meaning. Of all the souls I have intimately known, hers is the most worthy of imitation.

December 13th, 2022

 

September 22nd, 2022

“It’s not a stretch to say much of, if not most of, mainstream media has become conduits for shoddy propaganda … all intended to do two things, distract people from the real issues and serve as a bludgeon against anybody who dares to draw the attention back to them.”

Royce White, 9/18/22
 

September 5th, 2022

“Since the G7 oil price cap was announced on Friday, Russia has retaliated by cutting gas supply to Germany to zero, and joining forces with Saudi Arabia and others at OPEC+ to reduce global oil production. I’m going to go to the pub to drink some beer now.”

Javier Blas, 9/5/22
 

A ‘happy happy’ re-post from 2014

September 3rd, 2022

“The shoe that fits one person pinches another;
there is no recipe for living that suits all cases.”
— Carl Jung

The distinctive singularity of an individual has been a profound feature of my awareness throughout life. Undoubtedly, it is the basis for much of what I have enjoyed doing most — from solving visual problems for unique entrepreneurs, or creating my own brand of illustrated portraits, and, of course, hand-crafting greeting cards with collage miniatures. I shall never tire of assembling a spontaneous composition with suitable ingredients to honor a particular person. Each collage, like every human being, is a one-of-a-kind creation, and the medium is ideal for personalized expressions. The artist has a remarkable opportunity to interpret the peculiar constellation of personality traits, proclivities, and associations that befit a fellow mortal. To put it simply: I love it!
 

Dwindling Nest
collage miniature by J A Dixon
collection of J Hellyer

August 21st, 2022

“The buffoonish January 6 riot at the Capitol is often cited as proof of the insurrectionary right-wing movement. But the one-day riotous embarrassment never turned up any armed revolutionaries or plots to overthrow the government. In contrast, Antifa and BLM rioters were no one-day buffoons. They systematically organized a series of destructive and deadly riots across the country for over four months in the summer of 2020. The lethal toll of their work was over 35 dead, $2 billion in property losses, and hundreds of police officers injured.”

Victor Davis Hanson, 8/19/22
 

Pretty darn good Saturday . . .

July 30th, 2022

Training the trainers in Eastern Kentucky!
 

 

April 15th, 2022

“Charter schools don’t have such vocal and passionate enemies because they don’t work, but because they do. Therefore, they pose a threat to the education status quo. They threaten the current power balance that allows the interests of adults who run public education to come before what’s best for students. Bad schools stay open because those schools still provide good jobs for adults. Whether or not the children are learning is a secondary concern at best.”

Jason L Riley, 2/24/22

March Ex(clusion) — thirty-first day

March 31st, 2022

“What is it that confers the noblest delight? What is that which swells a man’s breast with pride above that which any other experience can bring to him? Discovery!”
– Mark Twain
 

March is going out like a lion — no big surprise there. Meanwhile, the March Ex(clusion) is declared OVER. It has unwrapped itself in a way that I never could have predicted. This whole thing originated as a time-management experiment designed to re-calibrate a design practice that I didn’t realize was fated for demise, in transition to my true calling. I’m an artist now, belatedly but wholeheartedly, as I dreamed I’d be since childhood. The March ritual has become an internal, near-sacramental custom — more difficult to describe than ever. But that’s not the point of it. The 31-day string of blog posts is just a way to modulate my attention span and, perhaps, to crystalize as relics a few word clusters with the potential to re-animate various worthy insights at a later time. Would that I had the talent and capacity to write down the many intangible illuminations that peppered this month! That’s not my gift, any more than the ability to devise winning basketball plays under pressure (like my godfather) or to compose organ music in solitude (like my grandfather). Spring (who has sprung) points me to the open air. I am better prepared to answer her summons with another March under my belt (and, before long, to enter my eighth decade). April, here I come.

Today’s sight bite— His severe yet compassionate visage, with the ever-present verdigris patina, —c-l-i-c-k— that man on the Danville obelisk, seeming to acknowledge and endorse the success of a ritual that I’ve conducted in some guise for 16 years.

March Ex(clusion) — thirtieth day

March 30th, 2022

“There is no chance, and no anarchy, in the universe. All is system and gradation.”
– Ralph Waldo Emerson
 

It’s been a long time since I read through older posts at this site, but for some reason I came across the astonishing 6 Mombonian Updates from 2007, which document my mother’s heart surgery. I can’t believe how much time I used to spend blogging, compared to the present time frame, but I’m glad I did it, and even more glad that BCA preserves it at XORPH.com (although the few entries the Mombo made at her own subsection are no longer visible, as far as I can tell). It’s seems fitting today to turn the rest of this post over to Joan and her pleasant message after visiting The Grandview:
      “Well, I was with Mombo for 2 1/2 hours this morning. It was a BVE (Best Visit Ever). Jerome is absolutely right. Now is the time to come visit. I got here at 8:30. She was in the dining room finishing up her breakfast. She had eaten a lot and was drinking apple juice out of a cup BY HERSELF. When I walked up she was trying to get it back on her tray without spilling it so I helped her. She said thank you and looked up at me. I said good morning and told her who I was (Joannie). She asked Joan Elaine Dixon? I knew right then we were going to have a BVE. She was more lucid that I have seen her in two years. Either spring has sprung in her brain or the covid fog has finally lifted. We sat in the dining room and had a long conversation. Then we went back to her room and she listened to music while I massaged her feet, legs, hands, and scalp. She complained about her legs hurting so I asked the nurse (James) about the supports for her wheelchair. They were not in her room but he tracked them down. I also asked Tina to let the helpers know that they should be put on if she is going to be in the wheelchair for any length of time. I tried to make some videos of parts of our conversations. Unfortunately the first ones are pretty lousy because I got my head in front of the phone so she could see me, and all you can see is my hair.”
 

Today’s sight bite—  a-b-o-v-e-!-! 

March Ex(clusion) — twenty-ninth day

March 29th, 2022

“Nothing, indeed, is so characteristic of Tolstoy as the painstaking attention he paid to his works. Even at a time when he was beginning to regard art as an evil, he remained the great artist who was never satisfied and in his search of unattainable perfection did not hesitate to criticize the best of his works.”
– David Magarshack
 

Sometimes I just want to hit my forehead against the double-brick facade of the Town House. After spending many hours over several days writing and refining a comprehensive artist statement for a major competition (with plenty of back-and-forth collaborative tension between Dana and me), I discover that a what I’d thought was a limitation of 5000 words was instead an clearly specified 5000-character maximum. AAUGHH!

Today’s sight bite— The tiny brown bird with speckled breast and long tail, fidgeting on my newly clipped bush.—c-l-i-c-k— An edgy wren, lady thrush, or juvenile sparrow? My ignorance is disclosed…