Did you ever wonder how authors who write fiction find ideas for their stories? I sometimes do it by observing, and later recording on paper, those small life stories I have witnessed. I prefer to catagorize them as Vignettes. Here is one of those Vignettes.

I was in an elevator one day in a condominium building at an Atlantic Ocean beach resort, about 10:00 AM on a sunny day in August. The building was facing the ocean, but it also had an indoor swimming pool. The walls of the elevator were made of glass so that the passengers could have a view of the pool as they rode up and down 

As I was waiting for the elevator to arrive and take me down to the pool level, a young little girl about three and a half feet high, in a swim suit, with a pony tail, and carrying a small stuffed Teddy Bear approached me.

“Have you seen my friend?  She’s dressed just like me,” she announced.

I allowed that I indeed had not seen her. We then entered the elevator together. Since we were the only two people in the elevator, it was very quiet. My young companion was looking out of the glass wall of the elevator toward the pool, searching for her friend.

“Is your friend younger or older than you,” I began.

“Oh, she’s older. She’s nine. I’m only eight.”

There was a long silence while she reviewed her statement. Then finally,

“I’m really not eight yet. My birthday is two months from now–then I’ll be eight.”

Now that her conscience was cleared, she turned to me and said,

“Goodbye,” and then she left the elevator headed for the pool to find her friend.

 I think that there was a message in there for all of us. I know there was a story there for me to write.

© 2008 by John Daly