Supporting the Troops' Families

An Interview by Tim Bete, Director of the Erma Bombeck Humor Writer's Workshop

Self-syndicated columnist Sarah Smiley shares thoughts on finding a niche and deodorizing a flight suit.

TB: Is Sarah Smiley your real name because it's a perfect pseudonym?

SS: Yes, Sarah Smiley is in fact my real name. I was “Sarah Rutherford” before getting married, and because that’s a mouthful, in school I was simply “Sarah R” or “Sarah Ruther.” It’s nice to finally have a name with the proverbial ring to it, and one that actually fits in the blocks on government forms. But there is that little hassle of making a dentist appointment and the receptionist thinking it’s a prank call. Some day I’d like to get my doctorate just so I can be Dr. Smiley and tell everyone I’m a dentist.

TB: How did you get your start writing?

SS: I’ve always been a writer, but never believed people actually make a living at it. So I went to school to become an elementary school teacher. Not that they make money either. My true calling, however, is storytelling. I’m the kind of person who seems to be a magnet for strange people and unusual circumstances. So there came that moment when I said, “I need to write all this down.” I constantly have the feeling I’m walking around in a Ben Stiller movie.

I began my career by writing for a small newsletter in Jacksonville, Florida. Once I built up enough clips, I went to the local military base paper and asked if they would publish my work. They agreed, and a few months later, the editor said her female readership had risen by approximately 30 percent. They asked me to keep writing on a weekly basis, and I built up more clips. Then my husband was transferred, and when we arrived at our new duty station, I contacted the local daily paper and said, “Hey, I think I’d like to write a column for you.” Seriously, I went about it that haphazardly. After all, what did I have to lose? At the time I didn’t have huge aspirations to be a writer. So the fear-of-failure thing was basically eliminated.

I published my first column at Pensacola News Journal in September 2003. Two months later, I self-syndicated it to newspapers across the country. And then some time between then and now, writing became my full-time career. I never planned it. It just sort of happened.

TB: Why a military column?

SS: The obvious answer is that I’m a military wife and daughter, and I’ve been a Navy dependent for all but six weeks of my life. I honestly don’t know any other lifestyle.

The idea for the column, however, came from a desire to portray the reality of military family life. Too often the media holds military spouses to some idealized standard. We’re supposed to belt out the Star-Spangled Banner as we wave goodbye to our spouse. We’re supposed to wear red, white and blue sweatshirts. And tsk-tsk if we don’t have a “Go Navy” sticker on our car or a flag with a goat on it hanging from the garage. This is how military families are typically represented. It’s what I call the Strong-Military-Wife syndrome.

So what’s wrong with portraying military families in a 1950’s Everything’s-A-Okay kind of way? Because when your husband is leaving for six months you don’t feel like singing. But that’s what society expects and it’s what they want to see. So when a spouse gets home and cries and curses the day her husband joined the military, she feels like a failure. What I’m doing is showing military spouses that we all have feelings of being sad, scared, angry and resentful. Feeling these things is natural and just as much a part of military life as red, white and blue bunting. We can be scared—even angry—and still be patriotic and strong. That’s the idea I hope Shore Duty brings to the American military family. Because I never want a wife to think she’s “the only one.”

TB: When did the idea for the book first hit you?

SS: I’ve been “writing” [Going Overboard] in my mind for several years now. It will be a memoir, so I’ve unintentionally practiced a lot of the material on friends at BUNCO parties and supper club as I recount my harried days and life as a military wife. Some of my close friends will read the book and recognize some of my best tales, such as when I took my son to a Ronald McDonald concert and sat on a folding table that broke beneath me. Or the time I locked myself out of my house wearing nothing but a cowgirl pajama shirt and pink flip-flops.

But the book is also about the drama of living like a single mother when your spouse is deployed overseas in a war. It’s about forming friendships with the other wives and making a quasi-family for yourself thousands and thousands of miles away from your real home. And I think that’s something the civilian world would like to get a glimpse of. It’s a side of the military that’s seldom told.

TB: What tips would you give to someone trying to break into humor writing?

SS: Finding your own voice is so important. When readers tell me they can imagine me saying the things I write, then I know I’ve hit the mark. Never try to emulate someone else’s voice. Be yourself and write with candor. Never be afraid. You won’t get anywhere in this business telling yourself, “someday I’d like to write and be published.” If you want that, sit down and write and start submitting. There’s no other way to do it.

TB: How did you go about finding your agent?

SS: I’m one of those people aspiring writers hate: my agent found me. He came across my work online and sent me an email. But it just goes to show how important exposure—and a good website—can be. You never know who’s reading your work!

TB: What advice would you give to a writer who had a great idea for a book but didn't have an extensive publishing history?

SS: Get published anywhere you can—in a hometown newsletter, online, anywhere. Don’t be afraid to take small jobs, they can lead to great contacts and experience. But most of all, find an agent. I simply could not have gotten my book deal without an agent. There’s too much to know about “the business,” and I’m too busy writing and getting Play-Doh away from my son’s mouth to figure it all out.

TB: How important is it for a writer to find his or her niche?

SS: Finding a niche is crucial, especially for columnists. Newspapers don’t go to print with blank “white space.” If they did, our job as journalists would be too easy. Then we could simply call the editor and say, “Hey, I noticed you have this big blank space in the Life section every Tuesday and I have a column that would fit perfectly!”

The most difficult part about selling a column, therefore, is not that you have to convince the editor of your writing, but that you have to persuade him or her to remove pre-existing text and replace it with yours. And this is where the niche comes in. Shore Duty has been successful largely because editors realize there isn’t anything else out there speaking to military wives. Removing other columns and articles to run mine has been important to editors because I’m writing for a niche market (military families) their paper previously haven’t addressed.

Basically, until you are a John Grisham or Dave Barry, you’re selling your ideas, not your name. Once you get to the point where your return address on the outside of an envelope is enough to excite editors and publishers, then you don’t have to worry about finding a “niche.” Then, you are the niche!

TB: Tell me how you first heard of Erma Bombeck? I love the fact that you hadn't heard of her before people started saying you wrote like her.

SS: When my work first started appearing, editors were comparing me to this lady named “Erma,” whom, believe it or not, I had never heard of. (I majored in elementary education. Enough said.) So I really didn’t give it much thought. Then one day a publisher said, “We think of you as a young Erma Bombeck. Can you live up to that?” I wasn’t a fool and I wanted the job, so I said, “Absolutely! Yes, of course!” Then I hung up the phone and said to my husband, “Who is Erma Bombeck?” In the weeks that followed, I learned everything I could about Erma. I read her books, studied her life, found her columns, and, of course, fell in love with her voice. Now I consider it quite an honor to be compared to Erma.

But I will say this: I’m somewhat relieved I didn’t know of Erma when I first began and when people started using her name in conjunction with my work. Because then I might have felt inside someone’s shadow. I’m happy I was able to develop my own voice and style first.

TB: Your husband is a Navy flight instructor. Is that like being married to Tom Cruise from Top Gun?

SS: Let me get over my laughter before I answer. I wish it was like being married to Tom Cruise in Top Gun! Unfortunately, the real military isn’t quite as glamorous. For instance, those green flight suits women traditionally think of as “hot,” are in fact stifling and therefore smell like an icky combination of sweat and jet fuel. When my husband returns from an assignment, I make him leave his “boat clothes” in isolation in a zippered bag in the garage until they can be detoxified (with a heavy can of Lysol). And those big black boots Cruise and Val Kilmer strut around in? In real life they leave inch-wide scuff marks on the kitchen linoleum.

Interestingly, however, my husband is often told he looks like Tom Cruise. To which I’ve been known to say, “Nah, don’t you think he looks more like Dustin Hoffman?” And, of course, now he has a difficult time living down the nickname “Tootsie.”

TB: What does your family think of your writing?

SS: Depends on the week and what my column was about. My husband suffers quite a bit of teasing as a result of my public wisecracks. But he takes it in stride. He knows if I wasn’t writing this stuff down, I’d be telling it at parties anyway.

My children have grown used to me suddenly pulling off the side of the road to jot down a column idea, and when I go racing to the computer repeating some sentence aloud over and over again, they know I’m about to work on my book and can’t be bothered or else I’ll lose my train of thought.

My dad, however, who is a retired Navy pilot, is glad I started all this after he left the military and when I was no longer “his” dependent.

Learn more about Sarah Smiley at www.sarahsmiley.com