Day 294 – Observation

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The Art of Extreme Observation: What Georges Perec’s 60-Page Parisian Stakeout Can Teach Every Writer

Imagine sitting at a cafe table in the heart of Paris for three consecutive days. You aren’t writing a sweeping historical fiction novel, inventing dramatic plot twists, or even checking your phone. Instead, you are simply acting as a human security camera—writing down the make of every passing car, the colour of a pigeon’s feathers, the exact time a woman in a green coat walks by, and the hum of conversation drifting from the bar.

This isn’t a mindfulness exercise; it was a radical literary experiment.

Over a full October weekend in 1974, French avant-garde writer and filmmaker Georges Perec posted up in Paris’s Place Saint-Sulpice. Armed with notebooks, he attempted to exhaust his subject completely. The result? An Attempt at Exhausting a Place in Paris, a fascinating 60-page essay that redefines how we look at the world around us.

So, is this something every writer should do? And more importantly, why should you waste an entire weekend staring at ordinary life when you could be drafting your next masterpiece?

Let’s dive into the radical genius of Perec’s experiment and explore why hyper-observation is the secret weapon every writer needs.

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What Did Georges Perec Actually Do?

Georges Perec was a member of Oulipo (Ouvroir de littérature potentielle), a loose gathering of French-speaking writers and mathematicians who enjoyed creating works using constrained writing techniques.

For his Place Saint-Sulpice experiment, Perec’s constraint was simple: record the infratrivial—the ordinary, the trivial, the background noise that people usually ignore.

Over Thursday, October 18, Friday, October 19, and Saturday, October 20, 1974, Perec sat at various cafes (Café de la Mairie, Tabac Saint-Sulpice) and noted:

• The weather shifting.
• Buses arriving and departing (Route 86, Route 63).
• Dogs being walked.
• The changing shadows of the Saint-Sulpice church.
• Fragments of overheard dialogue.

He wasn’t looking for a murder mystery to unfold. He wasn’t waiting for a celebrity sighting. He was deliberately focusing on what happens when nothing special happens.

As Perec wrote in the introduction:

“What happens every day and recurs every day: the banal, the quotidian, the obvious, the common, the ordinary, the infra-ordinary, the background noise, the habitual? How to account for it, how to question it, how to describe it?”

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Is This Something Every Writer Should Do?

Let’s be honest: you probably shouldn’t spend 60 pages detailing the license plates of cars in your local strip mall today. Most writers are already strapped for time, balancing day jobs, families, and actual writing deadlines.

However, every writer should adopt the mindset of Perec’s experiment.

Whether you write literary fiction, sci-fi world-building, high-octane thrillers, or creative nonfiction, doing a localised “exhaustion” exercise completely transforms your relationship with reality and your craft. Here is why you need to try it at least once.

1. It Cures “Writer’s Blindness”

Writers are professional daydreamers. We live inside our heads, plotting, planning, and worrying about character arcs. Because of this, we suffer from what psychologists call inattentional blindness—we stop seeing the actual physical world around us.

When you force yourself to sit still and record mundane details for an hour (let alone a whole weekend), the world snaps back into high definition. You notice how sunlight hits a cracked pavement, the precise way an elderly man adjusts his scarf, or the nervous tic of a barista dropping a ceramic cup. These are the sensory details that turn flat, generic writing into immersive, breathing fiction.

2. It Teaches You the Power of Constraint

In a world of infinite possibilities (blank Google Docs, endless plot directions), writers often freeze. Perec’s experiment proves that limitations breed creativity.

By restricting yourself to a single street corner, park bench, or coffee shop for a defined period, you remove the paralysis of choice. You stop worrying about what to write and focus entirely on how to capture what is right in front of you.

3. It Deepens Your Understanding of Pacing and Rhythm

Read An Attempt at Exhausting a Place in Paris, and you’ll notice the text has a rhythmic, hypnotic quality. It mimics the natural ebb and flow of daily life—slow lulls in the afternoon, rushes of commuter traffic, quiet evenings.

By practising extreme observation, you learn the natural cadences of the real world. When you translate this into storytelling, your narrative pacing improves. You learn when to speed up a scene (like morning rush hour) and when to let the atmosphere linger (like a quiet Sunday afternoon).

4. It Retrains Your Brain to Value the “Infratrivial”

The best stories aren’t always about explosions, dramatic breakups, or epic fantasy quests. Often, the most resonant moments in literature happen in the spaces in between: a conversation over lukewarm soup, the silence in a car after an argument, the way someone stirs their coffee.

Perec teaches us to pay attention to the background noise. As writers, our job is to make readers care about the ordinary. If you can make a 60-page essay about a mundane Parisian square engaging, you can make any scene in your novel compelling.

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How to Do Your Own “Perec Weekend” (Or Afternoon)

You don’t need to fly to Paris to channel Georges Perec. You can run your own micro-version of this experiment this very weekend. Here is how:

1. Pick a Mundane Location: Choose somewhere unremarkable—a local diner, a subway platform, a hotel lobby, or a bench in a suburban park. Avoid hyper-stimulating tourist hotspots.
2. Bring a Notebook (Not a Phone): Put your phone on Do Not Disturb. Use a physical notebook and pen. Digital devices invite distraction; paper demands presence.
3. Commit to a Timeframe: Start small. Give yourself one uninterrupted hour. If you’re feeling ambitious, try three hours.
4. Record Without Filtering: Write down everything. Do not judge whether it’s “interesting” enough. Write the mundane details: “12:15 PM. A pigeon with a missing toe lands near a discarded crisp packet. A woman in a yellow jacket walks past, looking at her watch. The hum of an idling delivery van.”
5. Review and Mine: Later, read back through your notes. Highlight the phrases, sensory triggers, and micro-moments that jump out at you. Drop these observations into your current work-in-progress to anchor your characters in a vivid, tangible reality.

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Final Thoughts

Georges Perec didn’t write An Attempt at Exhausting a Place in Paris to give us a plot blueprint; he wrote it to wake us up.

As writers, we are chroniclers of the human experience. But we cannot write about humanity if we aren’t willing to watch it—truly watch it—in its most unpolished, unscripted, and ordinary moments.

So, pack a notebook, find a bench, and start noticing. You might just surprise yourself with what you find when you stop looking for a story and let the world come to you.

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Day 293 – Writing exercise

…

Chloe Vanderhausen looked up and down the dinner table, far larger than was necessary for the five people who were sitting at it, and wondered, not for the first time, why she was sitting there.

That notion she was one of ‘the Vanderhausens’ was wearing a little thin, especially when her mother, Gloria Vandehausen, the woman that adorned more front pages of fashion magazines than any other, had told her not a half before that she had a tradition she had to uphold.

And she remembered the very words she had replied, in anger, that ‘she was not an object for all and sundry to gawk at’, that ‘she was just an ordinary person living in a zoo’.

Her brother Damien, the heir, and next Lord and Master of the Vanderhausen dynasty, had acquired all the airs and graces, and bad habits of his father, given that air of invincibility and untouchability granted by the family’s wealth and power, and had simply told her to shut up, do as she was told, and be ready to fulfil her obligations.

If it was anything like what her mother had to do, she wanted nothing to do with any of it.

The conversation was desultory, her brother was insufferable, her mother was condescending, and her father forbidding.  The only one who seemed to be happy was her stepsister, Amelia, seven years old, and young enough not to care a jot about any of their eccentricities.

Amelia’s life was like living in a fairytale castle.

For Chloe, that fairytale castle was a jail, and her life, well, she prayed a witch would come along and save her, using her magic to turn her into a plain, simple nobody.

Then her father spoke, “This Saturday night, the annual charity ball, everyone is to attend.”  Then he looked at Chloe.  “You will be polite and graceful, and no more of your histrionics.  You are a Vanderhausen, and you will behave like a Vanderhausen.  There is a gentleman I would like you to meet.”

Oh, God, she thought.  Not another matchmaking effort of her mother’s.

“Another old goat who had more money than sense.  I’m not interested in living in a castle, or a manor house. Or having everything you think my heart could desire.”

“You will do it for the benefit of the family, Chloe.”  Damien was only three years older than her and had settled for the girl his mother had selected for him, and they were to be married in a few months’ time.  She felt sorry for the girl, not knowing what she was getting herself into.  She couldn’t see that it was a transaction, not a marriage.

It was not what Chloe wanted for herself.

“You are too young to know what your heart could or could not desire, young lady,” her mother said in that even tone that could cut through six-inch steel.

She never raised her voice and had mastered the art of being heard, even if she whispered.  She might not have had the wherewithal when she first married, but she had acquired the Vanderhausen touch since.

But that’s what everyone saw.  Only Chloe knew that under that hard and sometimes severe exterior there was someone else, that girl she used to be, lurking just beneath the surface.  It was where Chloe believed she had got her rebellious streak from.

“And you honestly believe that marrying for purpose is so much better than marrying for love?”

“No this again,” Daniel muttered.  “You and this ‘I’m going to marry for love’ thing.  That only happens in Hallmark movies.”

Chloe burst out laughing.  “Wow, Dan, you’d better be careful you don’t say that out loud again, or people might think you’re almost human.  Good on Bethany.  She might actually turn you into something recognisable instead of the cardboard cutout you are at the moment.”

He glared at her.  “You would be wise to cease talking, Chloe.  Just do as you’re told.”

It was not a fight she could win, but the semi-smirk hovering on her mother’s face told her she had scored half a brownie point, but not enough to save her from that Saturday night fate worse than death.

Chloe’s rebellious streak had manifested itself into doing what she called secret missions, realising years ago that having all that money her family used as leverage and for making themselves wealthier, could also be used for helping others less fortunate, a project she had been investing in for the last three years, syphoning some of her allowance.

Hoping to make a bigger contribution, she had spent a lot of time trying to convince her father that there was merit in investing in the future of the less fortunate, that it would bring goodwill and respect from a whole new group of people, other than the business and political world in which he moved.

He seemed not to understand why anyone would waste money on people who inevitably wouldn’t appreciate it, and he insisted it was a job the government should do with the inordinately large amount of taxes he paid.

He spoke to her like she didn’t know anything about the world he lived in; they, for that matter, lived in.  When she said he didn’t pay very much tax, that her examination of the corporate accounts was as mystifying as he was to her, it stopped him in his tracks.

She could see he was going to tell her, like he usually did, that she had no idea what she was talking about, and then didn’t.  Sitting in the chair opposite his desk, in an office that was larger than some of the classrooms she had attended, he finally took a long, hard look at the daughter he had largely ignored, and smiled.

“You’re smarter than your brother.”

“Took you a while to realise it.  Not that it matters.  It’s not something I’m going to hold over him or challenge him for the leadership of the company.  I have my own ideas, and I will pursue them, whether you like it or not.”

“Then let’s do some horse-trading.  You humour your mother’s matchmaking attempts, and be reasonable when you decline with sensible arguments, and I will look at your so-called investment in the future of the less fortunate.”

Whilst nothing appeared to have happened in the months that followed, she still took time out to visit one particular charity, where they spent the afternoons creating sandwiches, baking small cakes and assembling quick and easy boxed dinners to hand out to the homeless, of whom there seemed to be an increasing number.  In her two years working with the group, the number of hungry people had almost doubled.

At least the people who worked there, from all walks of life, did not know who she was, because before she arrived at the warehouse, she went to a friend’s place and transformed herself into what she assumed was an ordinary person.  Unkempt hair, little makeup, a size or two too large clothes, and completely dropping her finishing school speech and deportment.

It had been difficult at first, but now she had it down to perfection, and so far, no one had recognised her as being a Vanderhausen, but that had a lot to do with the fact she did not go out of the town with her contemporaries and end up gracing the social pages of the media outlets, always looking for a celebrity in disgrace.  Her brother had not been so lucky.

But sadly, that might change after the upcoming Charity Ball.  It was the first year she was attending as a participant, having reached that age when her mother had decided she was ready to meet the world.  Chloe was not as sure the world would want to meet her.

For the moment, though, everyone there treated her like she was just another one of the team.  And, as it happened, there was one person in particular, a boy named Leo, who was not the average guy who tried to impress her with their charm, good looks, or wit.  Even in her disguise, she knew boys would be boys, but she made it clear she was not looking for a relationship; she just wanted to get on with her studies, work part-time, and wait until after graduation before considering anything serious.  Or even go out, because of the complications it could lead to.

Or possibly could, because Leo didn’t try to impress her; he just had that natural ability to fold you into his orbit and make you feel good.  And with all the expectation and demands her family put on her, just being with him was an amazing feeling.

Until it suddenly made her feel sad, because she was deceiving him, and after he had told her stories about the girls he had dated, the lies and half-truths, and the disappointments.  It was going to get impossible, and she was going to have to leave sooner if he discovered the truth, rather than later.  Until then…well, that was in the future.  Today, it was just another day at the office.

Leo Curruthers had never had it easy.  His father was killed in a freak accident going to work a few years back, and he and his mother had been left with a mountain of debt and no income.  He had to leave university, got two jobs, and from that point barely kept their heads above water.

It was not how he expected his life would go, but sometimes one had to make compromises because they were not the only people impacted by circumstances.  It was why he worked at the charity, to bank credits in the balance of his life, hoping it would cancel out all the bad stuff that had happened.

What did someone call it once, the pay it forward principle.

The trouble was, it didn’t feel like it had happened yet, or would.

Then, one day, a girl arrived, and he knew she was either going to be an angel or trouble.  It turned out to be the latter.  He should have recognised Angelique from the newspapers, the daughter of some rich industrialist who, unbeknownst to her workmates, was there on a dare by her friends that she couldn’t last a month without being unmasked and behaving like some ordinary person, while all the while her friends were documenting it.

And worse still, he had fallen for her, hook, line and sinker.

At the end of the month, her efforts were viral on the internet, humiliating him and just about everyone else, all taken in by some first-class acting.  She hadn’t cared who she hurt or the damage she had done.  Leo was the biggest casualty, and now viewed anyone like her as the enemy, firmly believing that people like him, and the others who worked there, were just pawns in their games.

It was why, when Chloe turned up one evening, looking to help, he almost sent her away.  He didn’t, but he did not believe she was just another person looking to help, because under that scruffy exterior, there was someone else playing a role.  She might not be another Angelique, but he would give her the benefit of the doubt, or until she messed up.  They, he believed, always did in the end.

But after nearly two years, she still turned up every Friday night, the night he assumed was party night for those who could afford it.  If Chloe had been that person like Angelique, she would have picked another night. 

And like clockwork, she arrived precisely at two in the afternoon, donned her apron and took her place on the line, ready.  Sometimes he worked next to her, but generally she kept to herself, speaking only when spoken to, did the work efficiently and quickly, having acquired the skills needed over the first month or two.  Usually those who assembled the boxes rarely stayed to distribute them, but she was one of the few who did.  It was a long shift, sometimes ending at three in the morning.

It was surprising that after all this time, all he knew about her was that she sometimes waited tables for unspecified cafes, that she studied art appreciation at a university, and lived in an attic room with her father and mother-in-law, in a quint house in Queens.  Where in Queens she wouldn’t say, and he had dabbled with the thought of following her to see if any of it was true, but in the end decided he was not going to get involved.  At the end of her shift, an Uber picked her up.  The same Uber.

And after two years, it surprised him how little he did know about her, or anyone who worked there, past and present.  She just did not talk about herself.  Perhaps that was a red flag. But the fact she was there, she turned up, and she did the work was a plus, and the organisation was glad of her help.  It would just be nice to know why.

Today, a little later than usual, he saw her in the line and went to join her.

She smiled when he squeezed in between her and Robert, a recent addition, and an admirer, one she was not trying to cultivate, but her charisma was overpowering sometimes. \

Leo realised, in that moment, the only reason he was standing there was jealousy.  He had seen Robert, who had asked about her back when he started, making a play and failing, but still fuelled odd feelings in him.  He had reminded himself about Angelique and how similar Chloe was to her, but it didn’t make a difference.

What probably didn’t help was that she liked him, though she had not said as much to him, but to a colleague, and in confidence.  He had wondered at the time whether she was spoken for but simply didn’t want to say so.

“You are late,” she said.  “More pressing things to do?”  It was in that banter tone they sometimes used, slipping into the easy conversation between long-time colleagues.

“Life.  It has a habit of getting in the way.”  He glanced sideways and saw the fractional change in her expression and realised he had said it more harshly than he had intended.

Everybody had problems, so what made his more important than anyone else.  “Sorry.  Bad morning.  Not your fault.”

“Sometimes it is hard not to let it impinge on your day.  You cannot always be in a good mood.  Even I can get grumpy.”

“I’ve never seen it.”

“You only see me on Friday.  You don’t want to see me on a Saturday.”

He bit his tongue, almost blurting out ‘why’ and realising just in time that it was none of his business, and that perhaps she was only joking.

He let out a gentle sigh.  “Remind me then not to cross your path on a Saturday.”

She looked sideways at him, trying to read the semi-blank expression he was trying to pass as nonchalance.  She knew he wanted to know more, but that was not possible.  Worse still, she wanted to know more about him and had toyed with the idea of asking him to have coffee one day, other than Friday.  Also impossible.

But then, it wasn’t quite true she didn’t know anything about him.  She did, but it was a one-way street.  He told her about his father, his mother, the debt, quitting university, and surviving.  Her story, if she told the truth, would probably disgust him: a girl who had everything handed to her on a silver platter, and now working in the warehouse to what he would undoubtedly believe was a silly rich girl trying to assuage her guilt?

Put like that, it would disgust her if their roles were reversed.

It was as far from the truth as possible, but she could never explain that.  He was there because he knew what it was like to have nothing; she was there because she wanted to do something that didn’t need her parents’ approval.  She doubted he would understand if she told him how much she contributed in funding to the charity.  In fact, she had insisted that the CEO could not tell anyone.

The last of the meals had been handed out, the night was done, and it was time to go home.

Leo looked at his watch, and it was late.  Later than usual.  Back at the warehouse, the last of the volunteers had left, and Chloe was waiting outside the door for her Uber.  It was late, and she was getting restless.

He wasn’t going to leave before her ride arrived, so he finished up and came out.

“Car late?”

“Unusual.  I have a standing request, and he’s always here.  Something must have happened.”

“I can take you anywhere you want to go?”  After two years, and the fact that they knew each other fairly well, he could make such an offer.

It surprised him to see her look of apprehension.  The late ride, or his offer?

“I don’t mean to sound forward, just that I can see the wait is causing you concern.”

Then, in a moment he could not explain why, he got the feeling she didn’t trust him.

“I mean, I know you don’t really know me, but I would like to think that I am trustworthy, given how much the boss can trust me with the closing up of the warehouse.”

Then he felt annoyed that he was trying to justify himself.  In the cold, dark street, lit by a single overhead light, their breath creating little clouds, he looked at her, really looked at her, and saw someone he didn’t recognise.   That bitter memory of Angelique flooded back.

Their eyes met, and he couldn’t help but feel, in that moment, of thinking of money, that same feeling he had after he had discovered Angelique’s perfidy.

“Who are you?”  It was out before he could stop it.

The headlights of her car suddenly illuminated the two, with their defined shadows etched on the wall of the warehouse, getting larger as the car got closer.

“Just an ordinary girl, Leo.  Nothing more, nothing less.  Just a girl who wanted to help those less fortunate.”

The car stopped, and the driver got out, going around to the rear and opening the door.

“Are you not coming next week?”

“No.  I can’t.  My circumstances have changed and make it impossible.  It was nice to meet you, Leo.  I hope you find what you’re looking for.”

“Wait.  Will I see you again?”

“Probably.  But not in a way you could imagine.”  She smiled wanly.  “Goodbye, Leo.”

She got in, the driver closed the door, and seconds later she was gone.

…

©  Charles Heath  2026

Day 293 – Writing exercise

…

Chloe Vanderhausen looked up and down the dinner table, far larger than was necessary for the five people who were sitting at it, and wondered, not for the first time, why she was sitting there.

That notion she was one of ‘the Vanderhausens’ was wearing a little thin, especially when her mother, Gloria Vandehausen, the woman that adorned more front pages of fashion magazines than any other, had told her not a half before that she had a tradition she had to uphold.

And she remembered the very words she had replied, in anger, that ‘she was not an object for all and sundry to gawk at’, that ‘she was just an ordinary person living in a zoo’.

Her brother Damien, the heir, and next Lord and Master of the Vanderhausen dynasty, had acquired all the airs and graces, and bad habits of his father, given that air of invincibility and untouchability granted by the family’s wealth and power, and had simply told her to shut up, do as she was told, and be ready to fulfil her obligations.

If it was anything like what her mother had to do, she wanted nothing to do with any of it.

The conversation was desultory, her brother was insufferable, her mother was condescending, and her father forbidding.  The only one who seemed to be happy was her stepsister, Amelia, seven years old, and young enough not to care a jot about any of their eccentricities.

Amelia’s life was like living in a fairytale castle.

For Chloe, that fairytale castle was a jail, and her life, well, she prayed a witch would come along and save her, using her magic to turn her into a plain, simple nobody.

Then her father spoke, “This Saturday night, the annual charity ball, everyone is to attend.”  Then he looked at Chloe.  “You will be polite and graceful, and no more of your histrionics.  You are a Vanderhausen, and you will behave like a Vanderhausen.  There is a gentleman I would like you to meet.”

Oh, God, she thought.  Not another matchmaking effort of her mother’s.

“Another old goat who had more money than sense.  I’m not interested in living in a castle, or a manor house. Or having everything you think my heart could desire.”

“You will do it for the benefit of the family, Chloe.”  Damien was only three years older than her and had settled for the girl his mother had selected for him, and they were to be married in a few months’ time.  She felt sorry for the girl, not knowing what she was getting herself into.  She couldn’t see that it was a transaction, not a marriage.

It was not what Chloe wanted for herself.

“You are too young to know what your heart could or could not desire, young lady,” her mother said in that even tone that could cut through six-inch steel.

She never raised her voice and had mastered the art of being heard, even if she whispered.  She might not have had the wherewithal when she first married, but she had acquired the Vanderhausen touch since.

But that’s what everyone saw.  Only Chloe knew that under that hard and sometimes severe exterior there was someone else, that girl she used to be, lurking just beneath the surface.  It was where Chloe believed she had got her rebellious streak from.

“And you honestly believe that marrying for purpose is so much better than marrying for love?”

“No this again,” Daniel muttered.  “You and this ‘I’m going to marry for love’ thing.  That only happens in Hallmark movies.”

Chloe burst out laughing.  “Wow, Dan, you’d better be careful you don’t say that out loud again, or people might think you’re almost human.  Good on Bethany.  She might actually turn you into something recognisable instead of the cardboard cutout you are at the moment.”

He glared at her.  “You would be wise to cease talking, Chloe.  Just do as you’re told.”

It was not a fight she could win, but the semi-smirk hovering on her mother’s face told her she had scored half a brownie point, but not enough to save her from that Saturday night fate worse than death.

Chloe’s rebellious streak had manifested itself into doing what she called secret missions, realising years ago that having all that money her family used as leverage and for making themselves wealthier, could also be used for helping others less fortunate, a project she had been investing in for the last three years, syphoning some of her allowance.

Hoping to make a bigger contribution, she had spent a lot of time trying to convince her father that there was merit in investing in the future of the less fortunate, that it would bring goodwill and respect from a whole new group of people, other than the business and political world in which he moved.

He seemed not to understand why anyone would waste money on people who inevitably wouldn’t appreciate it, and he insisted it was a job the government should do with the inordinately large amount of taxes he paid.

He spoke to her like she didn’t know anything about the world he lived in; they, for that matter, lived in.  When she said he didn’t pay very much tax, that her examination of the corporate accounts was as mystifying as he was to her, it stopped him in his tracks.

She could see he was going to tell her, like he usually did, that she had no idea what she was talking about, and then didn’t.  Sitting in the chair opposite his desk, in an office that was larger than some of the classrooms she had attended, he finally took a long, hard look at the daughter he had largely ignored, and smiled.

“You’re smarter than your brother.”

“Took you a while to realise it.  Not that it matters.  It’s not something I’m going to hold over him or challenge him for the leadership of the company.  I have my own ideas, and I will pursue them, whether you like it or not.”

“Then let’s do some horse-trading.  You humour your mother’s matchmaking attempts, and be reasonable when you decline with sensible arguments, and I will look at your so-called investment in the future of the less fortunate.”

Whilst nothing appeared to have happened in the months that followed, she still took time out to visit one particular charity, where they spent the afternoons creating sandwiches, baking small cakes and assembling quick and easy boxed dinners to hand out to the homeless, of whom there seemed to be an increasing number.  In her two years working with the group, the number of hungry people had almost doubled.

At least the people who worked there, from all walks of life, did not know who she was, because before she arrived at the warehouse, she went to a friend’s place and transformed herself into what she assumed was an ordinary person.  Unkempt hair, little makeup, a size or two too large clothes, and completely dropping her finishing school speech and deportment.

It had been difficult at first, but now she had it down to perfection, and so far, no one had recognised her as being a Vanderhausen, but that had a lot to do with the fact she did not go out of the town with her contemporaries and end up gracing the social pages of the media outlets, always looking for a celebrity in disgrace.  Her brother had not been so lucky.

But sadly, that might change after the upcoming Charity Ball.  It was the first year she was attending as a participant, having reached that age when her mother had decided she was ready to meet the world.  Chloe was not as sure the world would want to meet her.

For the moment, though, everyone there treated her like she was just another one of the team.  And, as it happened, there was one person in particular, a boy named Leo, who was not the average guy who tried to impress her with their charm, good looks, or wit.  Even in her disguise, she knew boys would be boys, but she made it clear she was not looking for a relationship; she just wanted to get on with her studies, work part-time, and wait until after graduation before considering anything serious.  Or even go out, because of the complications it could lead to.

Or possibly could, because Leo didn’t try to impress her; he just had that natural ability to fold you into his orbit and make you feel good.  And with all the expectation and demands her family put on her, just being with him was an amazing feeling.

Until it suddenly made her feel sad, because she was deceiving him, and after he had told her stories about the girls he had dated, the lies and half-truths, and the disappointments.  It was going to get impossible, and she was going to have to leave sooner if he discovered the truth, rather than later.  Until then…well, that was in the future.  Today, it was just another day at the office.

Leo Curruthers had never had it easy.  His father was killed in a freak accident going to work a few years back, and he and his mother had been left with a mountain of debt and no income.  He had to leave university, got two jobs, and from that point barely kept their heads above water.

It was not how he expected his life would go, but sometimes one had to make compromises because they were not the only people impacted by circumstances.  It was why he worked at the charity, to bank credits in the balance of his life, hoping it would cancel out all the bad stuff that had happened.

What did someone call it once, the pay it forward principle.

The trouble was, it didn’t feel like it had happened yet, or would.

Then, one day, a girl arrived, and he knew she was either going to be an angel or trouble.  It turned out to be the latter.  He should have recognised Angelique from the newspapers, the daughter of some rich industrialist who, unbeknownst to her workmates, was there on a dare by her friends that she couldn’t last a month without being unmasked and behaving like some ordinary person, while all the while her friends were documenting it.

And worse still, he had fallen for her, hook, line and sinker.

At the end of the month, her efforts were viral on the internet, humiliating him and just about everyone else, all taken in by some first-class acting.  She hadn’t cared who she hurt or the damage she had done.  Leo was the biggest casualty, and now viewed anyone like her as the enemy, firmly believing that people like him, and the others who worked there, were just pawns in their games.

It was why, when Chloe turned up one evening, looking to help, he almost sent her away.  He didn’t, but he did not believe she was just another person looking to help, because under that scruffy exterior, there was someone else playing a role.  She might not be another Angelique, but he would give her the benefit of the doubt, or until she messed up.  They, he believed, always did in the end.

But after nearly two years, she still turned up every Friday night, the night he assumed was party night for those who could afford it.  If Chloe had been that person like Angelique, she would have picked another night. 

And like clockwork, she arrived precisely at two in the afternoon, donned her apron and took her place on the line, ready.  Sometimes he worked next to her, but generally she kept to herself, speaking only when spoken to, did the work efficiently and quickly, having acquired the skills needed over the first month or two.  Usually those who assembled the boxes rarely stayed to distribute them, but she was one of the few who did.  It was a long shift, sometimes ending at three in the morning.

It was surprising that after all this time, all he knew about her was that she sometimes waited tables for unspecified cafes, that she studied art appreciation at a university, and lived in an attic room with her father and mother-in-law, in a quint house in Queens.  Where in Queens she wouldn’t say, and he had dabbled with the thought of following her to see if any of it was true, but in the end decided he was not going to get involved.  At the end of her shift, an Uber picked her up.  The same Uber.

And after two years, it surprised him how little he did know about her, or anyone who worked there, past and present.  She just did not talk about herself.  Perhaps that was a red flag. But the fact she was there, she turned up, and she did the work was a plus, and the organisation was glad of her help.  It would just be nice to know why.

Today, a little later than usual, he saw her in the line and went to join her.

She smiled when he squeezed in between her and Robert, a recent addition, and an admirer, one she was not trying to cultivate, but her charisma was overpowering sometimes. \

Leo realised, in that moment, the only reason he was standing there was jealousy.  He had seen Robert, who had asked about her back when he started, making a play and failing, but still fuelled odd feelings in him.  He had reminded himself about Angelique and how similar Chloe was to her, but it didn’t make a difference.

What probably didn’t help was that she liked him, though she had not said as much to him, but to a colleague, and in confidence.  He had wondered at the time whether she was spoken for but simply didn’t want to say so.

“You are late,” she said.  “More pressing things to do?”  It was in that banter tone they sometimes used, slipping into the easy conversation between long-time colleagues.

“Life.  It has a habit of getting in the way.”  He glanced sideways and saw the fractional change in her expression and realised he had said it more harshly than he had intended.

Everybody had problems, so what made his more important than anyone else.  “Sorry.  Bad morning.  Not your fault.”

“Sometimes it is hard not to let it impinge on your day.  You cannot always be in a good mood.  Even I can get grumpy.”

“I’ve never seen it.”

“You only see me on Friday.  You don’t want to see me on a Saturday.”

He bit his tongue, almost blurting out ‘why’ and realising just in time that it was none of his business, and that perhaps she was only joking.

He let out a gentle sigh.  “Remind me then not to cross your path on a Saturday.”

She looked sideways at him, trying to read the semi-blank expression he was trying to pass as nonchalance.  She knew he wanted to know more, but that was not possible.  Worse still, she wanted to know more about him and had toyed with the idea of asking him to have coffee one day, other than Friday.  Also impossible.

But then, it wasn’t quite true she didn’t know anything about him.  She did, but it was a one-way street.  He told her about his father, his mother, the debt, quitting university, and surviving.  Her story, if she told the truth, would probably disgust him: a girl who had everything handed to her on a silver platter, and now working in the warehouse to what he would undoubtedly believe was a silly rich girl trying to assuage her guilt?

Put like that, it would disgust her if their roles were reversed.

It was as far from the truth as possible, but she could never explain that.  He was there because he knew what it was like to have nothing; she was there because she wanted to do something that didn’t need her parents’ approval.  She doubted he would understand if she told him how much she contributed in funding to the charity.  In fact, she had insisted that the CEO could not tell anyone.

The last of the meals had been handed out, the night was done, and it was time to go home.

Leo looked at his watch, and it was late.  Later than usual.  Back at the warehouse, the last of the volunteers had left, and Chloe was waiting outside the door for her Uber.  It was late, and she was getting restless.

He wasn’t going to leave before her ride arrived, so he finished up and came out.

“Car late?”

“Unusual.  I have a standing request, and he’s always here.  Something must have happened.”

“I can take you anywhere you want to go?”  After two years, and the fact that they knew each other fairly well, he could make such an offer.

It surprised him to see her look of apprehension.  The late ride, or his offer?

“I don’t mean to sound forward, just that I can see the wait is causing you concern.”

Then, in a moment he could not explain why, he got the feeling she didn’t trust him.

“I mean, I know you don’t really know me, but I would like to think that I am trustworthy, given how much the boss can trust me with the closing up of the warehouse.”

Then he felt annoyed that he was trying to justify himself.  In the cold, dark street, lit by a single overhead light, their breath creating little clouds, he looked at her, really looked at her, and saw someone he didn’t recognise.   That bitter memory of Angelique flooded back.

Their eyes met, and he couldn’t help but feel, in that moment, of thinking of money, that same feeling he had after he had discovered Angelique’s perfidy.

“Who are you?”  It was out before he could stop it.

The headlights of her car suddenly illuminated the two, with their defined shadows etched on the wall of the warehouse, getting larger as the car got closer.

“Just an ordinary girl, Leo.  Nothing more, nothing less.  Just a girl who wanted to help those less fortunate.”

The car stopped, and the driver got out, going around to the rear and opening the door.

“Are you not coming next week?”

“No.  I can’t.  My circumstances have changed and make it impossible.  It was nice to meet you, Leo.  I hope you find what you’re looking for.”

“Wait.  Will I see you again?”

“Probably.  But not in a way you could imagine.”  She smiled wanly.  “Goodbye, Leo.”

She got in, the driver closed the door, and seconds later she was gone.

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©  Charles Heath  2026

Day 292 – Keeping a notebook

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Dorothy Parker’s lament about the notebook she can never keep—and always promises to start tomorrow—is the ultimate writer’s paradox. It captures the eternal tension between the desire to capture inspiration and the chaotic reality of the creative mind.

Here is a breakdown of why this quote resonates so deeply, both as a portrait of Parker herself and as a universal human truth.

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1. The Portrait of a Witty Realist

Dorothy Parker was famous for her biting wit, cynicism, and acute observations of human nature (as a founding member of the legendary Algonquin Round Table). Yet, here she is turning that sharp lens inward.

Instead of romanticising the writing process, she exposes the messy, disorganised truth. The quote is self-deprecating, funny, and deeply relatable. It reminds us that even brilliant minds struggle with the mundane task of object permanence and organisational discipline.

2. The Myth of “Tomorrow”

“I always say I’m going to keep one tomorrow.” Tomorrow is the magical land where all our bad habits are cured. Tomorrow, we will wake up organised, focused, and disciplined. By projecting the solution into the future (“tomorrow”), Parker acknowledges her failure in the present while maintaining a shred of hope. It’s a procrastination loop we all know too well: the intention is pure, but the execution fails, so we reset the clock to the next day.

3. The Irony of the Writer Without a Notebook

For a writer whose stock-in-trade was the clever quip, the biting review, and the memorable turn of phrase, losing her notebook is an occupational hazard. Writers are supposed to be collectors of stray thoughts, overheard dialogue, and fleeting images. Parker’s inability to keep track of her notebook suggests that perhaps the best lines weren’t dutifully written down—they were either remembered through sheer force of wit or lost to the ether forever.

4. The Universal Struggle

You don’t have to be a celebrated author to feel the sting of Parker’s words. We all have our version of the “notebook”:

• The fitness tracker left in a drawer.
• The budget spreadsheet we stopped updating by February.
• The grocery list written on the back of a receipt that is now lost in the abyss of a handbag or car console.

Conclusion

Parker’s quote endures because it normalises our flaws. It tells us that it is okay to be messy, forgetful, and perpetually optimistic about tomorrow. And perhaps, somewhere in that chaos, Dorothy Parker didn’t need the notebook after all—her best material was already living rent-free in her head.

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