January 19, 2012
MarkBernstein.org
 

Top Blogs: Mary-Kim Arnold

Nightmare Brunette is subtly elliptical. She appears to write with the complete, disarming frankness of a woman accustomed to talking about things we don’t talk about. Only gradually do you see that she’s talking about other things, too.

Mary-Kim Arnold writes a beautiful, lyrical weblog in which everything is elliptical and nothing seems entirely on balance.

Over breakfast, L. and I talk about the limits of love. She tells me about her son and the time he spends in and out of jail. He is so young – still a boy, really. He is due out, again, but she says she knows that it is only a matter of time. “Next time, we’ve already been told,” she says, “the sentence will be longer, he’ll be put in maximum security.”

She pokes at the contents of her bowl with a spoon. “We’ve already been told.”

There is always something in these wonderful posts — a new, well-crafted puzzle every day, where does she find the time to eat? — that speaks to the death of the writer’s mother or to the end of her first marriage. There is always something new.