274. June 28

This little notebook is, as the title implies, a book of thoughts. Here is where I collect the thoughts of the world--quotes from books as well as from life, characters and stories I come across that I don't want to forget, funny bits of conversations I overhear, curious facts, and anything that strikes me in a particular way. Here is where I collect the thoughts of my mind--word pairings and lines I like, ideas for stories, questions on life, and things to ponder. I began keeping a notebook such as this in my freshman year of college, due to the suggestion of an English professor in a creative writing class. It was the best suggestion anyone has ever given me concerning my writing. This little book is very dear to me.

I know a handful of other people who keep similar notebooks for all sorts of reasons. Every once in a while, a friend, or perhaps a stranger, will pull out a notebook similar to mine and I'll feel as though I suddenly have a small understanding of who they are in a way I never would have had were we not both keepers of notes. It's a lovely connection.

Someday, dear reader, this notebook, and other notebooks that have come and will come, will come in handy to my writing. In a few cases, it already has.

If you, dear reader, have every felt the ache of wanting write, or the passion to read, or the desire to gain education outside of a classroom, read Louis L'Amour's memoir, Education of a Wandering Man. It has thus far been the best education I have ever found on what it means to be a writer, a reader, and a pupil of life. It also happens to be delightfully entertaining. From L'Amour's work:

"...For a writer, of course, everything is grist for the mill, and a writer cannot know too much. Sooner or later everything he does know will find its uses. 

A writer's brain is like a magician's hat. If you are going to get anything out of it, you have to put something in first.

I have studied a thousand things I never expected to use in a story, yet every once in a while these things will find a place.

I have read because I loved reading, and I have learned because I loved learning, yet all one needs cannot come from books. It can come from sounds, from music, from the play of light and shadow, from the people one meets or those one does not meet."