After I fired off this letter to the editor of my local paper, I didn't really think anything would come of it. For one thing, if you read it closely you'll realize that I mistakenly assumed the writer I was disagreeing with was a military wife. She wasn't. She was only a military girlfriend, and a young one at that.
I wrote an e-mail to the editor explaining my mistake and making the correction, but I figured I had blown my chances of getting it published.
Then on Thursday night, the Editorials Editor called me and asked if she could turn my letter into a guest column.
I thought about it for half a second, and then said, "Sure." I then wrote a frantic e-mail to Aaron asking him to help me choose and clean-up a photo to go with the article. He suggested I fly him in to take a whole new head shot, but, sadly, my budget precludes such a thing.
I also asked my husband to read my letter. There was one very, very small part of me that worried for him. I mean, the military (and our branch specifically) is a lot more tolerant these days, but his career is our livelihood. A letter to the editor is one thing. But this had my picture and everything.
He thought it was a great letter. "It's a little harsh there at the end," he told me. "But it's so well-written."
I knew he would be nothing but supportive. But more than that, he was really proud of me.
So yesterday, my guest column appeared in the paper. Today, the PFLAG boards are all abuzz over who I might be.
And I've just got to say it. I've been published plenty of times before, but never about something I cared about. This is really kind of cool!
No comments:
Post a Comment