5 military things about me

1.  I was in the Army Reserve, the Army, and the Army National Guard.

Those are three different services.  I started out with the Reserve because it helped me make the decision and decided to enlist in the regular Army after Basic Training.  The National Guard was a big mistake, and I was glad to be finished with it.

2. I was the least likely soldier to be in the military.

I have “Adams Feet,” or flat feet.  The whole family on my father’s side has them.  In my case, I have high arches and they drop.  It makes me a terrible runner, and I can’t march well either.  They debated about me, then decided to let me in.  The debate happened again during Basic Training, and then again at my first duty station.  No one ever told me I had flat feet!

3. I went to war.

It was Desert Storm, when the thought of women deploying was strange and new and different.  The photo above was taken when President Bush visited us for Thanksgiving.

4. I was enlisted.

With the way everyone talks about the military in movies and film, you would think that everyone is an officer.  They make up only a small percentage of the military.  Enlisted are the bulk of the service.  Because I had a degree from a community college, I came in as a Private First Class (still a private) and left the military as a Specialist.  I’m afraid I didn’t aspire much to come up in the ranks!

5. My Basic Training was at Fort Dix, NJ.

I went during the summer.  Hot, really humid.  Imagine a heavy cotton jacket soaked with sweat, and that was what it was like for us.  Most alarming though were the signs posted on the words warning us about ticks.  Yikes!

More military stuff to see:

• Seriously, are meals in the military as bad as MASH portrayed them?
• What’s it like on a military post?
• Getting shot at on Paragon Trail
• The League of Extraordinary Women Veterans

 

Rule W: Write what you know and write only the stories you can write

Linda’s Rules of Writing

Sometimes “write what you know” seems like a mysterious and frightening thing!

We’re onto the letter W in Linda’s Rules of Writing of the A to Z Challenge, with the infamous “Write what you know.”

I think “write what you know” is one of the most interpreted pieces of writing advice out there.  Writers take it too literally, as a member of one of my critique groups did.  He was a human resources manager, so he figured that to “write what you know,” he had to make his character a human resources manager, even though there was no logical reason why such a job would have been involved in the actual story.

Allen Wold (Alien World if it helps to remember his name) said at one of the cons I was at defined”write what you know” as:

1. What you’ve experienced
2. What you’ve heard from friends and relatives and acquaintance
3. What you’ve learned from research

But I also ran across one more, which was from Write Faster, Write Better from David Fryxell.  It’s a book on freelancing, but Fryxell notes “Write only the stories you can write.”

I could research medicine for a medical thriller, but I know so little about the topic that I would have to spend enormous amounts of time on the research to more or less get it right.  Probably more time than even writing the story.  On the other hand, since I was in the army, I could probably write about a medic without having to spend as much time researching.

How do you use the infamous “write what you know” in your writing?

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Watch for photos of tulips in Washington, DC on May 3.  They are truly spectacular flowers!

Caption: A to Z Challenge Logo

 

Photo of soldier girl from Desert Storm

I was cleaning up and ran across this photo of me taken in November, 1990.  We had gone to see President Bush speak, and there were thousands of soldiers.  The belt is the gas mask, more properly known as a “protective mask.”  I later wore it more like a purse because it kept pulling down my pants.

 

Old War Stories: Women in Uniform

Put two vets together, and you get an instant rapport about shared experiences.  Doesn’t matter what generation it is — a vet is a vet.  I’m currently working on a submission for a as-yet untitled military anthology, which is due by October 31 (I’m hoping to find one of these when I actually have more of a lead time).  One of the things that has got me thinking, curiously, is the house my great-great-grandfather built.  My uncle is working on getting it declared a National Landmark, which is a really big deal.  One of the factors that will play into it is the story of the house.  Not how Havilah decorated it or its historic value, but the story of the descents of builders who came across country in a station wagon and found themselves with a legacy.  So, for this, I’ve been thinking, “What’s my story?”  It’s been a surprisingly tough question!

WRITING STUFF

Starting November 5, I will doing a month-long session on Forward Motion on “Basic Training of Military Culture.”  The lesson plan for the course is posted here.  The site’s just had a restructuring, so I will be flying by the seat of my pants for the course while I figure out how to use the technology.

 

What’s With This “It’s Hard — Don’t Try” Stuff?

Right now, I’m struggling with the bane of my existence — details.  One of my strengths is that I’m a big picture thinker, but details are very hard for me to work with.  I have to significantly shift how I think to get even specifics into the story, and it’s hard. My only choice is to work at it.  It’s possible it may never be easy for me to do details, though if I work at it, I can come up with techniques that may help.

I’m noting all this because I’ve seen a disturbing trend on writing message boards.  It starts out with a writer trying to do something that’s hard … Read the rest on Unleaded Fuel for Writers.

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Linda Adams — Soldier, Storyteller

Starting November 4, I will doing a month-long session on Forward Motion on “Basic Training of Military Culture.”  The lesson plan for the course is posted here.

My article Balancing Writing and Blogging is out on Vision: A Resource for Writers.

And a fun short piece on why these cats are green.

 

A short scene for your reading pleasure

This is just a quick scene I did for Forward Motion’s September Challenge.  When I heard the theme, I couldn’t resist.  The homecoming of soldier isn’t always about fanfare and parties.

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Drop by and check out all my non-fiction publications!  There are quite a few available online for your viewing pleasure.

 

Can You be too Goal-Focused?

Though I’ve read a lot of time management books, I’ve never thought of setting goals.   If you’d asked me a few years ago if I had goals, I would have said I was a goal-less person.  Turns out I’m very goal-focused.  Maybe too much.

Can you be too goal-focused? Read the rest on Unleaded Fuel for Writers.

 

Finding Inspiration in the Past

When I was in the army, the single soldier always seemed to be an after thought.  There wasn’t much for us beyond the gym, the library, and the rec center.  I used to go to the rec center a lot.  It had a big TV, games, and a place to hang out.  There was always this one guy there, a regular.  He was older than most of the other soldiers there, and I later learned he was a Specialist, retired.  To retire at a pay grade of E-4, which is one level above private, meant something bad had happened. 

Everyone stayed away from him, usually far away.  Because he was lost in his own world, a world of the past, a world of Vietnam.  Things happened in this world, and he talked to people in this world, and he made the sounds of battle in this world.

I thought about him as I started to write a story for an anthology themed “The Darkness Within.”  Soldiers see things and experience things, and sometimes those things are too much.  Twenty years later, I wonder what happened to him.

I never knew his name.

Visit my flash fiction story  Sand Dollar Wishes on Writer Unboxed!

 

Saluting Women Warriors of the Military

When I was growing up, it was front page news when women got into West Point.

When women like me went to war 14 years later, it was front page news.

When the women’s Vietnam memorial was unveiled in Washington, DC, 17 years later, people protested, saying women should not be honored.

Now 22 years after that, women are now being allowed to serve in the same roles as men.

Hoo-ah!

For you:  Do you have any stories about a veteran to share?  Or, if you’ve served, what’s your most memorable experience?

 

When Things Look Really Bad: Overcoming a Major Writing Obstacle

When I read Bill Blankschaen’s post on moving forward when you hit a wall on Mike Hyatt’s blog, it reminded me of when I crashed into one with my writing.  Maybe you’ve run into a problem which seemed impossible to solve — mine sure did!

I’d spent years trying to solve it — subplots did not evolve naturally for me in the story, and I believed this was causing my word count to run short.  I tried everything and came up with workaround after workaround.  But no matter what I did, the problem remained.

It was enough to make me want to give up.   Read more on Unleaded Fuel for Writers.