I tell my students–and it’s advice echoed by professional writers, fiction and non-fiction alike–to always keep a small notebook on hand. I tell them to look around, to observe the details around them, to jot down the strange, the funny, the unusual, the mundane. These fragments of reality, gleaned from real life can sharpen the verisimilitude of their writing.
I buy into the philosophy. I believe it.
I don’t do it.
I think about doing it. I should do it. Pieces of my own life and experience seep into my writing, why not broaden what I can work with?
I can’t answer for my hypocrisy. Laziness? Inconvenience? Distracted focus?
Regardless, I’d still recommend the practice, if only for this:
What I would have written down had I had a notebook:
I was in the parking lot of a grocery store. Loading my bags into my trunk, I heard the tell-tale clunk and squeak of a fast-moving grocery cart. I looked up to see an older gentleman, wrinkled face, white hair, grab onto the handles, hop both feet on the bottom and, like a kid, zoom across the pavement.
His smile made me smile.
There are no grocery carts in my novel; I can’t imagine using the scene, but I’ll tuck it away, and maybe one day you’ll see this man pop up in another one of my stories.
How many other moments like that am I missing when I live inside my own head and forget to lift my eyes and open my ears to what’s around me?
LESSON LEARNED: Writing is more than words on a page.