Read the beginning of "The Infinite Suggestiveness of Common Things" from Quotidiana by Patrick Madden:

"A few years ago, a curmudgeonly professor, a guy who was always giving me a hard time about my genre, asked, “What
will you do when you run out of experiences to write about?” He wanted me to admit that I’d have to turn to fiction or suffer the ignominy of rewriting the same handful of exciting experiences I’d had in my life.

I answered him by saying something about having children, how they were a renewable source of writing material, with their quirks and insights and inscrutable ways. And it’s true: kids are full of wisdom that you can write from. Not too long ago, my oldest daughter, who speaks both English and Spanish, misunderstood the Paul McCartney song “Coming Up” to say “Caminar like a flower,” which is, “Walk like a flower,” which I like better than “Walk like an Egyptian,” at least. And just the other day, another daughter, whom I’d just put to bed, grew impatient waiting for me to bring her a tissue. When I finally appeared, she pointed to her nose and explained, “I put the
booger back.” At least she didn’t wipe it on the blanket.

The essay is an open, leisurely form, somewhat allergic to adventure, certainly opposed to sensationalism. Even Montaigne, when he encounters a “monstrous child,” a traveling freak show exploited by his uncle for profit, turns his thoughts to a subversion of common notions of “natural,” with barely a mention of the exotic scene he’s witnessed. During my first extended encounters with the essay, I was struck (dumbstruck, moonstruck) by those authors who wrote from seemingly insignificant, overlooked, transient things, experiences, and ideas, who were able to find within their everyday, unexceptional lives inspiration for essaying. What is it Phillip Lopate says in the introduction to The Art of the Personal Essay? He says, “The essayist . . . aligns himself with what is traditionally considered a female perspective, in its appreciation of sentiment, dailiness, and the domestic.”"

To read a longer excerpt or to preorder Quotidiana, visit http://www.nebraskapress.unl.edu/product/Quotidiana,674205.aspx.