INTRODUCTION
What stories can you find? They are everywhere. People tell me I'm nosy. Well, I am but it's not personal I tell them. I believe that everyone has a story that can be written. My sister is in sales and she carries her business cards with her everywhere and hands them out to anyone she encounters. The serving person in the coffee shop, the mechanic who fixes her car, people she meets at parties. In my writerly way, I am trying to be like that. Not all of the ideas come to fruition, at least not right away. But I have a mental card file of sources for many stories. I also have a real card file where I keep notes on people I met -- a line or two on what their specialty is.
EXAMPLE:
I was talking to a friend of my son and when he said certain words, his tongue sparkled. Finally I leaned towards him and said, what it is it with your tongue? The young man seemed to spring to life as he stuck out his tongue to show me the silver bar that went right through the center of his tongue. He then went into a half hour non-stop explanation of body piercing nd showed me a number of the rings, bars and bangles that he had attached to his body. He described the procedure, the philosophy and the health risks of piercing as well as the best places for having the work done.
He's in my card file along with the names of several good places in town to have body piercing. I am planning an article on the health issues of piercing. I also am playing around with the notion of similar things people may have done in history. I vaguely remember a story about shoes in the 17th century in England where it became fashionable to have elaborate toes on your footgear. At first, simple curled up toes were the fad but that eventually led to shoes with that were so long they had to be attached to the person's leggings to keep them out of the way. (I'm sure my facts are really off but a little research will bring it all back.)
