Games Writers Play

Oldest Daughter and I watched The Wonder Boys on Saturday night. It is one of my all-time favorite movies, from Robert Downey Jr. arriving with a transvestite who plays the tuba to Tobey Maguire's brilliant performance. And of course, that it is about writers and editors makes it all the more fun.

And one of my favorite scenes is when Grady (Michael Douglas's writer/professor character)and his agent play a game inside a bar. They see a man who looks a bit like James Brown in a quirky sort of way, and begin inventing this history for him. "He's a former boxer who got that scar on his nose from a prize fight, and his name is Vernon, and he went to prison and . . ." and soon they have invented this colorful life for a man named Vernon (except his name isn't Vernon and he's none of those things).

I realized, watching it Saturday, that I do the same thing. I fill in the blanks on lives in airports and coffee shops. I meet people and imagine what their marriages are like or what keeps them awake at two a.m. If I see them line up their sugar packets neatly before tearing them and putting them in their coffee, I imagine perfectly arranged sock drawers and anal-retentive checkbook balancing and cupboards that are alphabetized.

I don't gossip. I don't take these imaginary filled-in lives and repeat them. I know it's all in my writer-mind. But I constantly fill in the blanks. I imagine full lives all around me.

I play games in my head. All the time.

So what games do you play?