"'Awesome' was a word we used a lot in Iraq. How to use 'Awesome': If someone says, 'Dude, it's your turn again to do shit-burning detail,' you say: 'Awesome.' 'Holy shit, those idiots in Delta company shot at second platoon,' 'Awesome!'"
That's a grim vocabulary lesson from soldier and writer Jason Christopher Hartley, our special guest this week and author of Just Another Soldier.
Ever since I read about the deaths of Andrew Olmsted (a soldier and blogger) and Scott Lange Kirkpatrick (a poet and soldier), the stories of soldiers have haunted me.
All week Hartley has reminded us how writings by soldiers in Iraq get misunderstood or buried under political rhetoric. Spend some time reading the writers who are caught up in this war.
If you want to even go farther, tonight, Kirkpatrick's family is holding a fundraising event to support wounded soldiers. As we end this week's writing interview, take a few minutes to remember the soldiers writing about this war: the active soldiers, the veterans, the wounded and the fallen.
Jason Boog:
How has the military blog community evolved since 2005? What do we need to be reading about?
Jason Christopher Hartley:
War is f**king weird as hell and if you don't feel conflicted and confused after reading about it, it's bad writing. Continue reading...
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