50 shimmering pages: Writing the First Novel

When I was in graduate school, my thesis advisor implored me to begin writing a novel. "I don’t want to put ideas in your head; you know, and I know, that I’ve been trying, telepathically, to get you to write a novel for two and a half years… close your eyes, but don’t think novel… that’s right, don’t think, novel, novel, novel, novel. When I see you next May, I expect you to hand me 50 shimmering pages of that novel... No pressure, though."

Yeah, no pressure. Fifty pages. Anyone can manage that. Oh, and be sure they shimmer.

My two biggest fears when I was in boot camp were that I would be handed the road guard vest and sent to the front of the PT formation and that Drill Sergeant Divine would point at me with that thin, black open palm of his and say, "Drop and give me fi'ty."

Being pushed is sometimes a great motivator for me. Sometimes a daunting challenge is just what I need to dig in and surprise myself. It worked in basic training, perhaps because I hated Divine as vehemently as he hated me. I would show him who was weak.

But writing has been altogether different, and far more difficult than packing a 50-pound rucksack through the sandhills of South Carolina. That was the summer I turned 18, and although I still can't believe I actually did it, I do know how I did it.

I still have the SMART book I was issued that summer in BT. "Soldier's Manual Army Testing (SMART)" is printed across the front, a 4" x 5" pamphlet we were to carry in our BDU pockets at all times. The SMART book's purpose, like basic training itself, was to make us look and act like soldiers and to teach us basic survival skills should we ever actually see combat.

I had no intention of ever seeing combat, nor, do I suspect, did any of my comrades in arms. Most of us were there for college money or to escape our parents or both. But that didn't make it any less terrifying. The previous summer I had been away at cheerleading camp, of all places, learning how to P-R-O-J-E-C-T my voice and earning "spirit sticks."

Never in my wildest dreams did I imagine I'd be loaded up in something called a cattle car (were we livestock?) and be asked to stand bare-armed, barefaced in a tent filled with a poison the likes of which I could only compare to breathing and bathing in EasyOff. Not once in my whole life did I ever see myself disassembling and re-assembling an M16A1 rifle or learning how to decontaminate my skin of chemical and biological hazards or self-administering nerve agent antidote into my own thigh. It didn't take long for it all to become real, very real. At night, I slept in uniform on top of my made-up bunk so that I would be ready for inspection the next morning on time. We were never prepared, and when suddenly a few of us had gotten wise, we were expediciously busted and the whole platoon paid for it. I called my mother on Sundays, begging her to notify the Red Cross that there was some emergency back home that required my presence, anything, just so long as she got me out of there! "Mama, Mama, can't you see," was the cadence we sang, "What the Army's done to me?"

One day we were marched to the PX to buy white cotton underwear so none of us would get yeast infections, one of many humiliating episodes that sweltering August, and the squad leaders were busted for buying candy and trying to sneak it back to the barracks. We were all guilty. I hadn't spent a cent of my payroll the whole time I'd been there except on white panties and black shoe polish, so I splurged along with everyone else, stuffing my pockets with Twix candy bars and M&Ms and something new, Rolos. But the drill instructors stripped the squad leaders of their arm bands and gave them to the four weakest recruits in the platoon, a mousy little thing named Charlotte, a nerdy redhead named Margaret, a sweet but heavy-set sloth of a girl named Irene--the same girl who was routinely made to lean against my back while I did push-ups off the wall--and me. The funny thing is, I thought the squad leaders were being punished.

As the newly appointed squad leaders, we four weaklings were sent to the front and back of every PT formation. Running in front of the pace-setters was hard enough, but running behind the group was impossible, for the pace is quicker in the back. What was worse than that was that we, the "road guards," were made to run all the way to the front of the formation to stop traffic at intersections, and then once the entire platoon had passed by, we had to book it back to catch up again. And there was no stopping, either. Oh no. When we reached each intersection, hearts pounding, we were made to run in place until all the others, the stronger girls, passed by. It was the most grueling experience of my life, but I did become a better runner for it.

Then one day it all became a joke. After being slowly tortured at drill and ceremony on the blazing black asphalt, we were sent for hand-to-hand combat training where we were to learn how to defend ourselves with an unloaded weapon. We were paired off and shown various holds and counter maneuvers for a time. Then the instructor told us to attach our bayonets to the ends of our rifles and proceeded to show us how to joust with an opponent. At some point, the instructor began shouting, "What are you going to do!" And our very expected response, "Kill, Drill Sergeant! Kill!" There we were, teenage girls, gouging bayonets at each other and screaming like banshees. "Kill! Kill, Drill Sergeant!" Suddenly it dawned on me how ludicrous it all was. For the first time in weeks, I laughed. And that's when I knew I had discovered the most valuable survival technique of all: not to take things too seriously. Ain't nothing but a th'ang, Drill Sergeant. Ain't nothing but a th'ang, we'd learned to say somewhere along the way.

I am often reminded how ineffectual we are when we succumb to fear, when we white-knuckle anything, our lives, our work. Writing demands more fortitude than anyone can ever properly prepare you for. MFA programs are boot camps (in the sense that they're total immersion communities) designed to make us look and act like writers, to teach us a few basic survival skills. But the battle with our own faltering confidence comes later, and I can tell you that no drill instructor or writing instructor has ever been so disappointed with me as I have been with myself. Writing, we're often told, is a muscle we must stretch and develop. It takes discipline, yes, but something else, too: courage of heart, trust in the powers that be, faith, one deep breath at a time. Fifty shimmering pages? Ain't nothing but a th'ang.