This maneuver is based on my husband’s helicopter pilot when Dan was a doorgunner in Vietnam.
The guy would fly over an engagement and shoot out the window with a .45. While the crew chief screamed at him that if he tilted the bird (Dan’s term) any further they’d all be joining the infantry on the ground. Or words to that effect. His other favorite scream was “OVERTORQUE! OVERTORQUE!”
I can’t get Dan to write any of this stuff down so I’m doing it. The answer to: “How dare you as a writer take real experiences and USE them?” is: “Because otherwise these stories will never get out and lots of time I have permission — and every time somebody tells me a cool story I add, ‘You DO know you’re talking to a WRITER?’ “ It’s really why I quit my census job — I’d never be able to use any of the stories or incidents I found during my work.
Sometimes I wish I was like the usual American and could dump my principles. You can’t hardly stay alive in this country if you have too many principles.
I’ve told people up here, repeatedly, “You’re talking to a reporter,” and they shrug and laugh — and then when the story comes out with their quotes they lose their minds. I TOLD THEM, damnit! Why did they think they were living in a vacuum?
It’s especially bad here — rural people are like comic-store fans; they think they are the navel of the universe and there’s nothing beyond the borders of their county. They travel and use the internet, but they’ll still say, “You know where Felix Rasmussen used to live?” when you’re trying to get directions. Even I have to tell people who’s the neighbor they know. NONE of them have any sense of land direction. No wonder they get lost.
It’s not just rural people, so you city people don’t feel smug. You know who I’m talking to, New York. You people won’t travel out of a borough where you don’t know where the bathrooms are. I almost spelled it “burrow.”
I’ll never forget how angry I was when my brother-in-law (from NJ) came to my wedding in Kentucky. Now, yes, I did live in a small town in the north central part of the state. But his first comment was, “WOW– you REALLY live out in the boonies!” I bit my tongue to keep from saying, “Well what the hell do you think the rest of the country looks like, you urban hick!”
try living in an area so sparsely populated that area’s arn’t towns, land references are whole counties. but at least there are interstates.
Well, we DO live in the boonies! And a lot of people mean it as a compliment — “I wish I lived here! How do you do it? How can I do it?” Which is kinda sorta why I started this blog: http://clallamatbay.blogspot.com I’m from MUKILTEO, for crimeny’s sake.
But, yes, we’re all in our own little end of the comic book convention, and we have to remember that. NOBODY is in our heads or lives the same.
Yesterday I had to meet a beekeeper at the “eagle and bear.” That’s two wooden chainsaw sculptures. You know, by the Pond House.