Heather Menzies Jones
www.WriterHeather.com
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What Fresh Hell?

Berlin - March 8, 2018

 

I woke up last night – not unusual – I wake up many nights at two or three regardless of wine or coffee – I’ve heard that sleep is disrupted at my age – people joke about it, although it’s not so amusing when it’s dark and one’s mind churns. I try to remember my German lessons, which article, das, der, die – which one adheres to which noun. Then a name becomes stuck. I can’t remember someone’s name a name that would have at one point in the past tripped off my tongue but now it unglues itself and only hours or days later will it pop unbidden into my head and I think I’m coming down with my heritable brand of cognitive decline.

Dispatches from the Pandemic

April 16, 2020

Notes made on March 16, 2020

Plague Times Begin

Morning:

Goals:

·         Focus on artistic achievement – writing, painting, editing

·         Keep up with my German language studies

·         Swedish Death Cleaning (aka as saving one’s living family members from the hassle of getting rid of parental posthumous clutter)

Around noon:

Somehow got sucked into network television and found myself watching, no not watching, riveted by Keeping Up with the Kardashians. Kim was in a quandary. She had to go to the Met Ball in New York City stat, but her near term baby gestating in the womb of a surrogate was due within mere days. Could she do both – attend the Met Ball and be there for the birth of her own child? Signs point to ‘yes’. I am watching as I write. Kim is now shimmying into a corset which is being tied so tightly (remember the scene in Gone with the Wind??) that a rupture of internal organs appears imminent. Her dress is completely transparent with the exception of some tiny, strategically placed lace thingies. Kim then starts riffing philosophically about the likelihood of having to pee at some point during the evening and says she plans to ‘just go down her legs’ and have one of her sisters clean her up.

3 p.m.-ish

Contemplating a nap and existential horror.  

That’s it. End of notes.

It has been a month and time now to look back upon my goals and mark the progress made.

Writing – see above.

Painting – made tiny alcohol ink paintings, glued them on little cards and sent cards to four people. Somehow, very satisfying.

Editing – only done on the day of writers’ group held via Zoom.

German – worked on translation two times – story about a pirate and a magic clock. Nicht gut.

Swedish Death Cleaning – are you fucking kidding?

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Kim at the Met Ball

heather jones