You never know where you’re going to find something amazing to write about.   I mean so bizarre and with such possibilities of turning into metaphor, that you rack your brain figuring out how your characters (if you’re writing fiction) can run into this themselves, and what will it mean to them. Or what would be the subtext if you wrote it into an essay.

So here’s what happened. I was in Butte, Montana with my husband and he needed to see the welder about a sign that’s being made for his cattle ranch.  It was about 95 degrees out and I didn’t want to wait in the car so I went in the office with him. The welder, a nice guy in his thirties was at the desk. He went through the paper work, talked to my husband about the sign for his grass fed cattle (bizarre in itself considering that I’m a vegetarian) and idly I turn around, not really wanting to address the cattle for profit business, and I see this huge fish tank (picture the length and size of two coffins laid end to end) and in it, along with the fish, is a crocodile, five feet long and staring at me. I mean, he’s really looking at me, checking me out.  Now this is not Florida or a place where a crocodile might possibly seem to be more or less at home. This is Butte Montana.  And it’s in an office. And the crocodile has eyes as big as a dog’s.  But  at the same moment that I’m so creeped out, I’m thinking: this is gold.  Amazing! 

The wonderful thing about being a writer, whatever happens we take notes, we ask questions, it’s material. (this of course can annoy your family and friends, especially when they’re telling you something personal that’s amazing and bizarre.)  So I asked the guy about a million questions, and went home and wrote up the crocodile story.  What to do with it is a whole other matter.

To Do: What have you run into lately that’s bizarre, or even mildly amazing or astonishing?  If you live in LA just go out on the street and wait a few minutes. Take notes. If you live in Montana, all bets are off.