Theft by Finding: Diaries 1977-2002
David Sedaris
For Dawn “Friendship Flower” Erickson
Author’s Note
Occasionally in this book I have changed people’s names or slightly altered their physical descriptions. In some cases I’ve changed a name because the person in the preceding entry was also a Jim or a Mary, and I wanted to avoid confusion. (How is it that I have so many Steves in my life and only one Thelma?) I’ve rewritten things when they were unclear or, as was more often the case in the early years, when the writing was clunky and uninviting.
Introduction
Not long after deciding to release a book of diary entries, I came upon a five-pound note. I’d been picking up trash alongside a country road in West Sussex, and there it was between a potato-chip bag and a half-full beer can that had drowned slugs in it. Given the exchange rate, the bill amounted to around $8.15, which, as my mother would have said, “Ain’t nothing.” A few days later I met with my friend Pam in London. The subject of windfalls came up, and when I mentioned the money she asked if I’d spent it.
“Well, of course,” I said.
“In the U.K., if you discover something of value and keep it, that’s theft by finding,” she told me. “You’re supposed to investigate whether it was lost or stolen, though in this case—five pounds—of course you’re fine.”
Theft by Finding. It was, I thought, the perfect title for this book. When it comes to subject matter, all diarists are different. I was never one to write about my feelings, in part because they weren’t that interesting (even to me) but mainly because they were so likely to change. Other people’s feelings, though, that was a different story. Got a bone to pick with your stepmother or the manager of the place where you worked until yesterday? Please, let’s talk!
If nothing else, a diary teaches you what you’re interested in. Perhaps at the beginning you restrict yourself to issues of social injustice or all the unfortunate people trapped beneath the rubble in Turkey or Italy or wherever the last great earthquake hit. You keep the diary you feel you should be keeping, the one that, if discovered by your mother or college roommate, would leave them thinking, If only I was as civic-minded/bighearted/philosophical as Edward!
After a year, you realize it takes time to rail against injustice, time you might better spend questioning fondue or describing those ferrets you couldn’t afford. Unless, of course, social injustice is your thing, in which case—knock yourself out. The point is to find out who you are and to be true to that person. Because so often you can’t. Won’t people turn away if they know the real me? you wonder. The me that hates my own child, that put my perfectly healthy dog to sleep? The me who thinks, deep down, that maybe The Wire was overrated?*
What I prefer recording at the end—or, more recently, at the start—of my day are remarkable events I have observed (fistfights, accidents, a shopper arriving with a full cart of groceries in the express lane), bits of overheard conversation, and startling things people have told me. These people could be friends but just as easily barbers, strangers on a plane, or cashiers. A number of their stories turned out to be urban legends: the neighbor of a relative whose dead cat was stolen from the trunk of a car, etc. I hope I’ve weeded those out. Then there are the jokes I’ve heard at parties and book signings over the years. They were obviously written by someone—all jokes are—but the authors are hardly ever credited in the retelling.
Another thing I noticed while going through my forty years of diaries is that many of the dates are wrong. For instance, there might be three October 1, 1982s. This was most likely because I didn’t know what day it was. Time tends to melt and run together when you don’t have a job. In that prelaptop era, you had to consult a newspaper or calendar to find out if it was Wednesday the eighth or Thursday the ninth. This involved getting up, so more often than not, I’d just stay put and guess. Quite often I’d even get the month wrong.
It might look like my average diary entry amounts to no more than seven sentences, but in fact I spend an inordinate amount of time writing about my day—around forty-five minutes, usually. If nothing big happened, I’ll reflect on a newspaper article or a report I heard on the radio. I’m not big on weather writing but have no policy against it. Thus when life gets really dull, I’ll just look out the window and describe the color of the sky. That will lead to something else, most often: a bird being mean to another bird or the noise a plane makes.
Starting around 1979 I began numbering my entries. It’s a habit I still maintain.
December 28, 2016
One. It’s only December and already…
Two. Dad called on my birthday. “I’m trying to visualize where you’re living,” he said. “Are there a lot of power lines out where you are?”
Three. Hugh stormed out of the kitchen yesterday, leaving me, Candy, Amy, and Ingrid, who was in the middle of a story about her mother.
Four. I ran into Michael at the Waitrose…
Five. Carrie Fisher died yesterday…
Six. Hugh just came in and told me…
This is what cavemen did before paragraphs were invented, and I’m not sure why I don’t just indent or hit the space bar twice. Another old-fashioned practice I maintain is carrying a notebook, a small one I keep in my shirt pocket and never leave the house without. In it I register all the little things that strike me, not in great detail but just quickly. The following morning I’ll review what I jotted down and look for the most meaningful moment in the previous day, the one in which I felt truly present. It could have been seeing an old friend, or just as likely it could have been watching a stranger eat a sandwich with his eyes closed. (That happened recently, and was riveting.)