by Reality producing something better than anything I could have invented
I had a genuinely funny thing happen today that I did not write, could not have written, and simply got to witness firsthand, which is its own particular pleasure in this line of work, watching reality produce something better than anything I could have invented on purpose.
What actually happened
I was sitting in a cafe, working on an entirely unrelated piece, when I overheard a conversation at the next table so specifically, perfectly absurd in its escalating logic that I stopped typing entirely just to listen, notebook quietly open under the table in case I needed to capture the exact wording before it slipped away.
I will not repeat the specifics here, partly out of respect for the two strangers who had no idea they were being quietly documented, and partly because I suspect it will resurface, suitably transformed, in a piece of my own eventually, once enough time has passed that using it feels less like eavesdropping and more like proper creative distance.
Why this kind of moment matters so much
Moments like this are, I think, the actual fuel behind most good satire, not cleverness invented from nothing but genuine attention paid to how absurdly people actually talk and argue and escalate small disagreements when they think nobody worth impressing is listening.
I have started to believe that the writers who produce the sharpest, most specific work are simply the ones paying closer attention to ordinary life than everyone else, rather than the ones with access to some special reservoir of cleverness the rest of us lack.
The rest of the cafe visit
Beyond the overheard conversation, the actual piece I had gone there to write made only modest progress, mostly because I spent considerably more time than planned quietly listening rather than typing, a trade-off I do not regret in the slightest given what I walked away with instead.
I did eventually finish enough of the original piece to feel the visit was not a total loss on that front, though I suspect the overheard conversation will end up being the more valuable outcome of the whole afternoon regardless of what I originally went there intending to accomplish.
A brief note on the walk home
The walk home afterward was spent mentally replaying the conversation, testing different ways it might eventually work into something usable, a kind of quiet creative processing that happens almost involuntarily whenever I encounter genuinely good raw material like this.
I do not always know, in the moment, exactly how or when a specific piece of overheard material will eventually surface in my own work, but I have learned to trust that the genuinely good ones do eventually find their way in, sometimes considerably later than I expect.
Looking ahead
I do not know yet what shape this will eventually take, whether it becomes its own standalone piece or simply a small detail folded into something larger down the line, and I am choosing to let it sit for now rather than forcing it into use too quickly.
Some material needs time before you can see clearly what to actually do with it, and I suspect this is exactly that kind of material.
More writing diary entries at Stephanie Curry, Bohiney.
The notebook habit, explained
I have carried a small notebook specifically for moments like this for years now, a habit that started almost accidentally after losing what I am fairly sure was a genuinely brilliant overheard line simply because I trusted myself to remember it later and, predictably, did not.
The notebook itself has become something close to a running archive of exactly this kind of raw material, fragments of conversation, strange small details, entire scenes noted in shorthand that only make sense to me months later when I finally return to mine them properly for use.
What made this particular escalation so specific
Without repeating the actual content, what made this conversation genuinely remarkable was the specific speed and confidence with which the disagreement escalated from something trivial into something the two participants seemed to genuinely, sincerely believe mattered enormously, entirely without either of them seeming to notice how far the stakes had drifted from the original topic.
This particular pattern, small disagreements accumulating unearned weight through sheer momentum, is one I have used before and will almost certainly use again, though today’s specific version had a rhythm to it that felt genuinely fresh despite the underlying structure being fairly familiar territory.
A final thought on paying attention
I think the actual craft, more than any particular writing technique, is simply this, staying genuinely curious and attentive in ordinary moments rather than assuming inspiration only arrives during deliberate research or scheduled brainstorming sessions.
Thanks, as always, for reading along with today’s small, overheard gift.
Tomorrow I will return to my actual planned piece, though I suspect today’s overheard fragment will keep quietly nagging at me in the background regardless of what I am officially supposed to be working on.
Such is how good material tends to work, arriving on its own schedule rather than mine.
End of today’s entry.
SOURCE: https://bohiney.com/
