I was picking up some cargo at the Averitt Express yard down in Fayetteville a while back, and after the forklift operator got my crate loaded in the trailer, we chatted for a few minutes.  He glanced at me briefly and said, “Military?”

 I grinned and hesitated for a moment while I tried to remember whether I’d worn an obvious hat, or t-shirt, or belt buckle, and he said, “I’ll bet you wonder why I asked.” He didn’t wait for a response, but pointed down at my feet and said with a laugh, “Your boots are polished.”

I had to stop and consider it, but here I was, driving a four-wheel-drive pickup with a big dog drooling out the window, pulling my own cargo trailer, wearing an old ball cap and t-shirt with faded blue jeans…but by golly, my boots weren’t scuffed up.  He didn’t mention it, but there’s a chance the U.S. flag on my front license plate and the flag magnet on my tailgate might have been tiny clues as well.

I was 30 years Air Force; he was 4 years Army.  We talked like old friends who haven’t seen each other for a while.  He said he asks that question of about 10 people a month or so, and he’s right with at least 9 of them.

Actually, I’m used to being pegged.  I don’t mind and I don’t hide it; I’m proud of my military service.  I don’t think I know a veteran who isn’t.  A lot of them are pretty obvious at displaying their status, but even when they aren’t sporting a bumper sticker or wearing that hat or t-shirt, there are plenty of tell-tale things veterans notice about one another, and the longer you spent in the service, the more likely you are to have built up some habits.

Some seem a little strange, some are just repetition and muscle memory, and some are for survival.

Yes, I polish my boots; not with a spit shine any more, but enough to keep the leather in good condition so it lasts and gives me long service.  The military pounded that into my head — if you take care of your equipment, it takes care of you.  That’s a good philosophy for most things.

Of course, there are other habits that just…are.  I find it almost impossible to wear a hat indoors, or to go outside without one.  I tend to fall in step with people I’m walking next to.  I make my bed every day, even though I’ve gotten a little lax about that bouncing-quarter thing.  I carry umbrellas or briefcases or shopping bags in my left hand, in case I need to salute a superior officer.  Or grab a weapon.

A lot of us cringe a little at fireworks, sonic booms, or backfires.  Some of us cringe a lot, or run and hide.  Some of us just can’t take it at all.  The ones who can, try to take care of the ones who can’t.

We get a little nervous in large groups of people.  When we go to a restaurant or bar, we like to sit with our backs to a wall, facing the door.  We look around a lot to see what others are doing.  Sometimes that makes the other people nervous.  We’re okay with that.

We can stand in line patiently for what seems forever, often for no discernible reason.  This comes in handy at the doctor’s office and the DMV.

We can eat the same food every day, every week, every month, if that’s what we get…and we know that a little Tabasco sauce makes almost anything edible, even MREs.  Sometimes we go without for a while.  We can also eat an entire meal in five minutes and maybe take a second helping with us on the way out the door.  This seems odd when we’re eating out with friends at their favorite restaurant, they say.

A veteran is likely to own a gun, if not several, and store it properly and safely, and keep it clean and in working order, and stay prepared to use it in defense of himself, his family, or his country.  And he’ll fervently hope he never has to.

Once you’ve been in the military, it’s a different world. You look at people and situations differently.  You’re more cautious, suspicious.  But when you trust somebody, you trust them with your life, because you find out sometimes you have to, and it becomes what you do. You see differences in skin color, heritage, and customs everywhere you go, because the more you learn, the better you adapt and survive.  But you also learn that skin color is just like hair color…it can be used to identify someone, but says nothing about character.

A veteran will stop what she’s doing when she hears the National Anthem or Taps, or sees a flag marching by, and will face the flag or the music, and render a salute.  And she’ll teach her kids to show their respect, too.  She’s been to other countries, and seen their customs and governments and standards of living, and she knows that our country has no equal, whatever its detractors might say.

A veteran knows that what he has done in the service of his country is vital to its continued existence.  He’s sacrificed a lot of things and missed a lot of things, like births, deaths, first teeth, proms, celebrations, holidays, funerals, birthdays, and weddings, and he regrets all of that but not the choice he made that caused him to miss them.  He knows that many other veterans have sacrificed a whole lot more, and gives them the highest respect.

Most veterans don’t ask to be honored, or thanked for their service, or given special parking places outside hardware stores, or given parades.  Of course they appreciate recognition, though most are a little embarrassed about it.  What most want, above all, is for everyone else to follow their example in loving their country, and supporting it, and honoring it.

So for this Veterans Day, that’s what we ask.  Think about patriotism and what it means to you and the country.  Remember those who have committed themselves to the preservation of liberty.  Support your country in a way that honors that commitment.  Protest if you think you should, work to change laws that need changed, and let our elected officials know what’s right or wrong about our nation, because that’s what liberty is all about.  But remember that a great nation is made great by its people, so strive to be citizens who are worthy of it.

Whether you wave the flag on your license plate or hat or front porch, or just figuratively in what you say and do, do your part to keep Old Glory flying high.  Show us your sign.

This is a good discussion on rituals that help you write, by Stephen Graham Jones. I try to stay away from rituals because they put you in a mindset of needing certain conditions to exist before you can be productive. That doesn’t mean I’m successful in staying away from them, but I do try. And in reading this, I recognize myself in Mr. Jones’s trap of a self-made gauntlet that’s also a ritual, and that really needs to be something more of us are aware of.

I almost fell into it again when I read this article. I subscribe to the Writer’s Digest newsletter, along with others, and when a whole bunch of emails get stacked up, I read through what looks interesting, copy down the URLs for the ones I’d like to discuss in a blog post, and get back to perusing all those other emails I need to look at. Along with Facebook, Instagram, other blogs, fetching the mail, checking the weather report, practicing guitar, and on and on. So I stopped myself and started this blog entry and I’m going to finish it and be proud of myself just a little.

So here’s Stephen Graham Jones. He’s worthy of a listen because he’s successfully written and published and overcome his own non-ritual ritual situation, at least occasionally, and has things to say that show you you’re not alone when you do what you do, and make you think about how to do it all better. So take a look. Couldn’t hurt!

The Case Against Writing Rituals

Many writers have certain requirements in order to get to writing: the right lighting, a particular pen, or a favorite mug. Author Stephen Graham Jones offers a different perspective on ways to get to work without ritual.

STEPHEN GRAHAM JONES
Sep 9, 2021

I have two axioms I fall back on for writing. The first is from one of my uncles. We were working on a tractor out in the field one day when he stopped and told me that if I ever waited to have kids until there was enough money for kids, that I’d never have kids.

While pretty suspect advice to give a 16 year old, I’ve always just applied this to writing: If you wait until you’re good enough to try this novel, to submit to this market, to query this agent, then you’ll never write that novel. You’ll never submit to that market. You’ll never talk to that agent.

You can’t wait, you’ve got to just jump. Like Bradbury said, build your wings on the way down.

This has never failed me. I’ve gotten plenty of rejections, I’ve had a novel or two fizzle halfway through. But I’ve gotten a lot of acceptances, too, and finished many more novels than not.

The other axiom is more Dr. Spock—the baby-book one, not the Star Trek one. It’s that old saw about new parents throwing a raucous dinner party in their apartment. Very soon it becomes time to put the baby to bed, so the dinner guests try to hush themselves. But these parents tell them no, no, keep going, be as loud as you can, be louder if you want, please. We want to train this kid to fall asleep no matter the noise. If this kid starts needing special conditions in order to sleep, then all bets are off.

How I’ve applied this to writing is that I shouldn’t need special conditions in order to get some words down on the page. Which is to say, I should be careful of ever ritualizing this thing. It doesn’t need to be a certain time of day, I don’t need to have this or that special mug, the curtains don’t need to be open or shut, the light can be however, and who cares what sounds are leaking in to wherever I am?

This has always worked great for me as well. All I need to get some pages down is a single seat in a bustling airport, or a corner of this hotel lobby, or an overhang mostly out of the rain at this bus stop. The more you can train yourself to write anywhere—everywhere—the more you can get done. While part of thinking like that is not falling into the trap that “writing is special” or “sacred,” the bigger part is just being able to turn the world off, lose yourself in another one.

However, strict as I’ve always tried to be regarding this—no rituals! no rituals!—it’s so easy to slip, isn’t it? I mean, fiction, it basically works by magical thinking, which is a lot like superstition. 

Example: About 15 years ago, I was wearing this one ugly winter hat for a novel I was writing, and that novel worked out. So? I naturally ascribed the magic to that hat, and made it my new writing buddy. Every time I sat down to the keyboard, I’d pull that hat on, get cooking.

All it took to break me of that, though, was accidentally answering the door while wearing that hat the following summer, and seeing in this guest’s hesitant eyes how ridiculous I was being. I threw that hat away fast, kept writing. Problem solved. Easy.

Until it wasn’t.

Barbara Poelle is one of those people you just have to like.  Well, you don’t have to, but you do anyway, because she’s funny and witty and gives out good advice and is a literary agent with the Irene Goodman Literary Agency.  You’ll like that last part even more if you send her a query for your masterpiece and she starts stalking you in hopes of acquiring it.  Before she got into the Agent Biz, she was a freelance copywriter, and editor, and even a standup comic, which you can easily believe if you read her columns.  The columns I speak of are in Writer’s Digest and are titled, “Funny You Should Ask,” and they answer all sorts of questions about writing and the publishing business.  This is one place you can get all that good advice.

But wait…there’s more!  Writer’s Digest gathered 10 of her columns together in a handy little bunch and sent them to me so I could find out a whole lot at once.  They didn’t do it because they like me…they did it because I subscribe to their newsletter.  So here’s a plug for their newsletter: it has lots of good stuff in it and you should subscribe if you want to see good stuff, like Ms. Poelle’s columns.  A really good reason is that it’s free, and you can also unsubscribe if it doesn’t suit you, so it looks like you’ve got nothing to lose here.

But if you haven’t subscribed already, I’m here to lead you to all those links with an enticing little intro to whet your appetite for a little more of Ms. Poelle’s advice.  So below is a sample column and a link to the bunch of other columns, and here’s a small heads-up to go with it: the Writer’s Digest link to the second column accidentally goes back to the first column, so the real link to the second column is right HERE.   Feel free to bounce back and forth willy-nilly.  You’re welcome.

And there’s even more!  She has written a book that’s available on Amazon, and it includes over 100 of her columns, along with writing exercises, submission checklists, and who-knows-what-all-kinds-of-happy-stuff.  And HERE’s a link to that so you can wangle yourself a paperback or Kindle copy, and now you have access to all kinds of Barbara Poelle stuff.  What’s not to like?

10 Writing and Publishing Questions Answered by Literary Agent Barbara Poelle

Author: Barbara Poelle
Aug 30, 2021

Editor’s note: Funny You Should Ask is a rare column that just happens to appear in each issue of Writer’s Digest magazine. It’s humorous, for sure, but it’s also loaded with great writing and publishing advice from an actual literary agent. In this post, we’ve collected 10 columns written by literary agent Barbara Poelle. 

Funny You Should Ask: What Is Going to Be the Next Big Trend in Fiction?

Funny You Should Ask is a humorous and handy column by literary agent Barbara Poelle. In this edition, she discusses the next big fiction trend, and whether or not all books are the same.

Barbara Poelle
Jul 24, 2021

Dear FYSA,

What is going to be the next big trend in fiction?

Signed,
Pencil Poised

Dear Poised,

I am so glad you asked. I have been absolutely dying to tell someone. The next big trend is going to be … Amish steampunk crossover YA told in second person.

Right? I know! How did we not all see that one coming? It is so obvious!

OK, fine, that most likely is not the next trend, but it could be. Trends, generally speaking, are usually ignited in two specific beats on a publishing timeline: When a novel is shopped and at point of publication. The books we sell to publishers today in most cases will not see the shelves until fall 2022, so the themes, tropes, and trends you are seeing today were mostly put into motion up to two years ago when a title was initially shopped to the marketplace.

When a superbly conceived novel is sent out for consideration and creates enough enthusiasm for an auction, there can only be one winning editor. The underbidding imprints will then have a whetted appetite for something similar, and may reach out and say “Hey, I just lost an auction for an amaaaaaaazing Amish steampunk crossover YA, do you have anything similar?” And that is how you may get a bloat of steampunk YA in a future publishing season. (I have recently become obsessed with the names of groupings of animals. Like a bloat of hippopotami—could I be any more delighted with that?—and I am trying to pepper them into everyday usage. Just let me.)

When a novel is published to fanfare and the ensuing word of mouth builds enthusiasm, booksellers will be more inclined to be looking for “the same but different” from publishers in order to keep readers returning to their registers. Like when Gillian Flynn’s Gone Girl published and we soon saw a smack of domestic thrillers riding that wave. (Guess what that one is … jellyfish! A smack of jellyfish! I am barking with glee.)

However, let me be clear. I know I have said this before, but it is worth saying many times because I believe the real question being asked of me here is: What should I be writing in order to get that book deal? You should be writing a novel that pays attention to craft, technique, and detail. You should be writing a novel with fully realized characters, accessible yet nuanced imagery, and a storyline that promises the reader a journey both into the world and themselves. You should be writing the novel that your muse says is worth the time and effort and makes you sweat to make every word count. That’s the parliament you want to be counted among. (OWLS! *cackles with glee*)

Dear FYSA,

Let’s be honest. All books are the same. The only difference is in how much marketing and publicity they receive. How do you get a publisher to spend some real money on a book?

Signed,
In the Know

Dear In the Know,

I think you used the wrong homophone in your signature, because I feel like it’s more like, In the NO! Gosh mister, whoever put the beetles in your cornflakes this morning really accomplished their goal—you are gettin’ up swingin’ today, and how! (I don’t know if I used “and how” correctly but try saying that sentence out loud like a newsboy in the 1800s and you’ll find it immensely satisfying.)

I would like to start by asking that we set down the idea that “all books are the same.” That doesn’t serve anyone as an author or a reader—and I feel that you and I could find so many titles that defy that sentence.

So! Let me say—there are certain books tapped by the publisher to get the lion’s share of a marketing budget, and some that aren’t. That will be determined most often initially by the P&L generated by the publisher at point of offer. The P&L (profit and loss) will use a variety of data points to predict how the book might perform in the marketplace versus how much it will cost in labor and production and therefore give a ballpark for the advance. The marketing budget will be included in that labor and production portion. (The dollar amount for a budget is not usually shared at point of offer, or even ever, with the author and her agent, but an overview of intent will be.) This amount will certainly inflate if there were multiple competitors bidding at point of sale, and that is one way an agent can “get” publishers to spend more—having a spectacular novel that was in high demand to begin with.

BUT! I have seen, many times, books organically explode on the scene with word of mouth in-house, in early reviews, and from social media tastemakers, and that is nothing about the publisher spending money, but a clear mandate by the readers that what they have read is, ahem, original and exciting. To feel more invested in what this can look like, start paying attention to what makes you finally decide to buy a book—start to read like a consumer as well as a reader and an author—and starting turning your “no” into a “know.”