Work 1. Stacked Logs in Snow
Well here we are in January to start the season. Usually we begin with a ploughed field and the associated imagery of the fresh start to send us along so it has been a different feel this time. Back in October when we proposed our extension and the possibility of the January start emerged it seemed like the idea was logical and it is from a calendar point of view but we are used to following the seasons from the plough. But look here does not the winter start offer its own seasonal logic? Is it perhaps even more of a positive format in the sense of beginning in the cold and dark and slowly emerging into the light of spring, although it could be read equally as going from the cold and dark with a brief burst of light before returning to the gloom in November before finally wrapping it up at solstice. It is however, as we have discussed, all academic as I fully intend this to be my final Dignity Scholarship season so it matters not all this musing, but perhaps you should make visitors aware of the situation on the introduction page. I only suggest it as I have discovered of late from some acquaintances in London that our first two seasons have been well read by a small but growing base of fellow travelers, all no doubt having been tipped off about our efforts from Green Dave.1
To the matter then of this 2021 season and the change in format that I lobbied for and which you have sanctioned, namely the dispensing of those pesky five themes in favor of a more extensive proposal. Firstly and speaking objectively, I must apologise for that flabby, repetitive, meandering doggerel that frames us2 and this despite my defiant postulations made in the introduction. Secondly I make no apologies whatsoever for it as an out-pouring, as regurgitation, as dream, because it is just this avalanche of suggestive social, cultural and political associations that just might make it worth a damn as a framing alternative. After the end of last season there wasn’t a lot of time to digest before starting up again and that is perhaps why we have such a spiraling, widely cast net of a poem. Indeed it was put together over Christmas in short order and redrafted in January to account for the charge at the steps.3 As we write this entry we are two days from the inauguration of Mr B.4 but I cannot see any drama worthy of another redraft. I think the touch paper was lit on the day of the capitol charge but it didn’t take and if we were going to see any coup-like drama it would have been then. That said I have one or two ideas about the layout of the site this season to bring the works and the proposal into contact a little more for ourselves and any third parties which way roll in but there is plenty of time to sort that out. Perhaps it is prudent to begin in low gear and steady chug, like the tractor that just drove past the window, and tell you about our opening study of snow covered logs.
It is a small 15 this, of the logs. We had imagined a period of further rest to allow my sciatic nerve problem5 to subside but yesterday on our daily walk up the forest path we passed by a woman with a chainsaw heading off to fell one for firewood. Dressed up to the nines in tree felling gear she was, including combined visor, helmet and ear protector, and holding the saw in one hand and a bottle of juice in the other, she was not able to exchange and saw us past with a stern nod. We kept an eye on her as we circled, watching her as she selected and went to work on one of the birches lining the path. One assumes she owns the path?
Walking past some forty minutes later she was gone but the tree she felled into the field was layed out in nice sliced up chunks rather like one might butcher a falukorv.6 Laying there in the fresh powder the logs took on a saturation of yellowish green bordering on the toxic but it was not until we encountered the scene once more this morning and saw the logs now stacked up in a pile that we decided on a study and taking great care to neither twist nor lift more than the minimum we gathered our necessaries and pulled them down the path in the pulka7 and set about it. The first study since our post election soil of November8 which saw us out of 2020 and the lack of practice showed in some early dithering but this was soon put to bed by the cold which as always provides the necessary incentive to act decisively; we lashed it on in an hour.
As for the season, our plans and that introduction we have left you with, it all needs discussing. Indeed our idea to talk to the 'sentient Borg' no doubt needs some explanation also as it is hardly a no brainer9 of an idea but we have our reasons for proposing it. I should say however that we had planned to post video entries to accompany the works this season but owing to my daughter having lost her phone the one I had hoped to use as a camera has slipped from our grasp and into hers, so unless you have one knocking about the videos will have to wait.
A journey of a thousand miles...
John
1 Benefactor and subject of The Wretched Painter video series made during a break in John's Dignity Scholarship work last season.
2 Referring to Dane Bowers
3 Refers to the march of supporters of far alt right politician Donald J Trump which descended into an attack on an important building in the USA.
4 President Biden.
5 John has suffered with sciatic nerve pain for several months. Mention in line 10 of Dane Bowers.
6 A type of processed meat in the shape of a large sausage.
7 Sledge.
8 The final work of last season.
9 Slang term meaning obvious.