Artandicon's Blog

  • More Sunsets

    How many of us get to admire the great creative exuberance of the divine palette strewn across the sky twice a day in our ordinary days? Most of us are too busy breakfast grabbing, caffeine swilling, clothes donning, and storming the door in a mad dash for the morning rush to work. Then we join…

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  • Alone in the Woods

    Life for extroverts in the Age of Social Distancing is difficult. They need people to bounce their ideas off of, friends to hear their tales of daily struggles or victories, and most of all, the transfer of energy between the parties to feel alive. For introverts, most of whom need space and quiet to restore…

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  • Art and Life in the Age of Coronavirus

    Some people are hoarding toilet paper and hand sanitizer in this germ conscious age of Coronavirus, but we who practice the art life are also stocking up on Liquitex heavy body acrylic paint and canvases plus coffee, so we can make the best of a bad situation. We’re also giving encouragement to all we meet…

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  • Rabbit, Rabbit! Welcome to February!

    “The hurrier I go, the behinder I get.” If I think Christmas comes too quickly at my stage of life, I could say the same for the rapid passing of my days. My parents in retirement would collapse in their matching gold fabric chairs after a busy day of volunteering and ask each other, “How…

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  • The Character of a Methodist

    Wesley’s Historic Teaching on Holiness John Wesley wrote extensively to teach the Methodists of his day the tenets of the faith. We teach seminarians the historic doctrines, but many think these are “dead ideas of a long ago world.” Wesley gave us 52 Standard Sermons and the Notes on the New Testament, both of which…

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  • Strawberry Mindfulness

    I read a wonderful journal, Psychiatric Times, which has a free subscription online. I began reading it because it helped me to understand the diseases of the mind, which cause people to be at dis-ease in their lives and to cause dis-ease in whatever community in which they belonged. In today’s modern world, our first…

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  • THE SEASON OF LIGHT

    As the days grow short, some of us yearn for the light. This week I put up a few Christmas decorations, including my ceramic Christmas tree with the plastic bulbs from the 1960’s and my door wreath with ornaments from the 1950’s. I have a copper and paper manger scene I set before a small…

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  • Icon of Christ the Redeemer

    My latest icon of the face of Christ is based on the Napkin of Christ or The Image Not Made by Human Hands. The tradition tells us the Lord washed his face on a cloth and the image of his face transferred directly to it. King Abgar took the image bearing cloth to Edessa and…

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  • Day of the Dead Altars

    Some things I take for granted, since I had the great privilege of knowing my great grandmother in her last years. I knew all but one of my grandparents, since my daddy’s father died when I was only a year old. Even my daughter knew both her Nana and all four of her grandparents. Growing…

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  • Crossroads and Callings

    Nine years ago…how time flies when you’re having fun! I was at a crossroads in my life, however, with a preexisting health condition I’d managed to live with successfully through three high stress careers since 1977. Accumulated stress isn’t good for the body, so my seizure disorder began to make itself visible. When my neurologist…

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