This past weekend, I took a rental car down the North Island of New Zealand.
Due to great timing, I was able to film a music video with the talented Simeon Duncombe (my chief collaborator on Chronesthesia, my first feature film) and to attend the Wellington screening of Loop Track (directed by Tom Sainsbury, my co-writer and co-star in DEAD).
Spaced throughout this trip were a bunch of catch-ups—which I enjoyed—and unplanned, unavoidable periods of waiting—which I struggled with. These periods of waiting were caused by commonplace occurrences like an issue with the rental car, my stepdad needing to go get a blood test, interminable amounts of roadworks, and forgetting to bring my gym keycard. Every time something got in the way of my day, I struggled to stay present.
Whenever this happens, my first instinct is to pull out my phone. If I don’t have any notifications, I’ll unlock it anyway, open up a random app, and swipe around for a bit. I’m sure I’m not alone in this.
👀 The Amount of Life We Risk Missing
I am a fiend for opening Instagram when I don’t need to. Once I’ve exhausted Instagram, I’ll open messaging apps, my Photos, and my email. For no reason. I have the feeling that you might be the same.
By defaulting to the same mini-dopamine hit whenever we feel ourselves in danger of being bored, we’re missing out on a raft of story ideas.
There are stories everywhere. People-watching is a helluva pastime. I’ve always been into it, but lately it’s gotten a lot more fun because I consciously wonder:
Why is that person doing what they’re doing?
And, more importantly:
What EXACTLY is that person doing?
🩺 Robert in the Waiting Room
While I’ve been down here visiting, I had to join my stepdad at the local medical centre for a routine blood test.
While I was sitting in the waiting room, I noticed that I’d been scrolling through my phone and achieving nothing. I hadn’t brought my Kobo, so I couldn’t read, and I was determined not to be the kind of person whose nose is forever stuck in a phone.
Next to me, a typical kiwi farmer sat with a straight back, his hands on his knees like a schoolboy ready for class photos. His fingers were tapping away, either from nerves or boredom.
“You lived in the Wairarapa long?” I asked.
The man took a second to make sure I was really talking to him, then answered: “Not even a year. But I love it. I just love it.”
“It’s nice,” I said, struggling to muster the appropriate amount of enthusiasm for the place. “What do you like about it?”
The conversation flowed as waiting room conversations do, centred around the weather and the current state of politics. Then, the man revealed something extremely personal about himself and his situation. The man—whose name I’d later learned as Robert—was recently diagnosed with prostate cancer.
Rough straw to draw. The big C. I didn’t want to be glum about it, though I didn’t want to be chirpily optimistic about it either, seeing as I lacked any personal experience of such a trauma. I had a family member suffer from it, but following an operation and eight months of radiation, he was lucky enough to make a full recovery. I offered up this anecdote in hopes of giving Robert some hope.
“Ah, I wish it were that easy for me,” he said. “They found the cancer early, so my chances were good. But because they were so confident, they didn’t perform my biopsy for four months, and by the time they did more tests, the cancer had turned into little growths in my bones.”
Shit.
Robert had been dealt a rough hand. Wanting to steer gently away from his grim prognosis, I asked him about the support he was receiving.
Big mistake.
Turns out, poor Robert is estranged from all three of his children. Shit! Why did I have to go and stick my stupid nose into his business? But I couldn’t just end the conversation, could I? That’d be rude. You know what I did instead?
I asked him more questions, like an idiot.
I expected the conversation would soon be pulled down into the depressing weeds of Robert’s painful personal life, but miraculously, he cheered up. He made jokes about his situation, and I got the feeling he hadn’t been able to talk about it to anyone else for a while.
When my stepdad emerged from the nurse’s office, I introduced him to Robert, wished Robert all the best, and left feeling … conflicted.
I’d gained insight into a stranger’s life, and it left me with a yearning to more fully appreciate my own good fortune and health. All of these feelings bounced around inside me for the next few hours, and I made a note to call upon these feelings for a specific scene in the book I’m currently writing.
Why was Robert doing what he was doing?
Well, this much was obvious. He was waiting at the doctor’s office for some sort of test.
What EXACTLY was Robert doing?
He was sitting politely, in a way he’d probably learned to do a long time ago. He wasn’t slouching or scrolling on his phone. He didn’t have any reading material, and he didn’t know anybody around him. He was evidently nervous, but his nerves manifested in silence. Typical stiff-upper-lip kiwi male behaviour.
The way Robert made jokes about his situation made him seem like an upbeat sort of person, but the fact that he’s estranged from his children raises all sorts of intriguing questions: what happened?
🌟 Other Random Inspirations
During my trip, I came across countless points of inspiration: scenery that evoked a certain feeling in me that I wanted to capture in a story, interactions I noted down to be recreated in words, and random thoughts and feelings about life that’ll no doubt find their way into whatever I’m writing.
At 6:30 a.m., I drove past these giant wind turbines. They rose out of the mist like Leviathans and made me want to write a sci-fi story about gigantic creatures.
This is the view from New Plymouth, one of the towns I stayed in. On one side, you have islands and the ocean, and on the other, you have snow-capped Mount Taranaki (known for gracing the background of The Last Samurai with Tom Cruise, doubling as Mount Fuji).
I considered how, after living in the township for a month, the spectacular view would become commonplace. That led me to wonder if anyone would notice if the mountain changed slightly every day. And what could cause that phenomenon?
All sorts of random ideas followed.
I rode a $1 electric train with my mum and stepdad, purely because we were walking by and decided to give it a go. I made a quick note about it because it’s a setting I’d never considered before: a tourist mini-train. Surely a fun adventure scene could happen there, right? There was even a spooky tunnel.
🤳 Let Yourself Be Bored
Next time you find yourself stuck somewhere you don’t want to be, take up the challenge of keeping your phone in your pocket and looking around at what people are doing. Allow yourself to consider the reasons why they’re doing whatever it is.
Why is that guy walking his dog right now? What happened to him an hour ago? Maybe the dog is actually his girlfriend’s dog, and he hates walking it, or maybe he has to put it down next week, and this is one of the last walks they’ll do together.
The more you practice, the easier it becomes. Any time you stumble upon an interesting idea, write it down. I guarantee that within a week, you’ll have a long list of random ideas, and you can draw upon your list whenever you need some inspiration while writing.