I learned a big lesson the morning after my last post “Hit the Gas or Get Out of the Way”, my wife reads my blog, and everything I confess here better be okay by her. Performing death defying maneuvers on the freeway got me a scolding and the look. She has dark brown Latina eyes and when she’s ticked, well, they pierce me all the way back to birth.
So, I better watch what I’m doing on this blog and the freeway.
I do have to say it’s about time for accountability for centuries of subjugation, and the rise of the powerful woman. When I say rise, it doesn’t mean women haven’t been powerful all along, they have, but also ignored, discounted, mistrusted, and all around devalued. I saw it in the military in the seventies and eighties. Strong and smart women working twice as hard to get to the same rank or position of influence as mediocre men, and I had the privilege to meet or work with a few.
Innocence of my faults in this is not where I am going. One of the worst times early in my marriage was because of the disrespect I showed my wife’s opinion. When I finally saw it, the realization was painful that I had treated the woman I love that way. I vowed to change, and it was hard, but more than worth any effort or sacrifice. Almost thirty years later we share an awesome marriage and partnership.
Where I am going is this; powerful and flawed female protagonists are awesome to write about. I was at work when I first heard Miranda Lambert’s “Vice”. It hit me like a slap to the face and I couldn’t wait to get home to write. That was the beginning of my first pure mystery of the same name. My protagonist, May, is an awesome character with a ton of talents, super smart and deeply flawed, who has surprised me more than I imagined. Right now, I am about halfway through the first draft, and working on a second half worthy of who she has become.
Since then , I have also written a short story with a strong female protagonist, “Highway Radio”, that I think you might like. I posted it on my “stuff” page for your reading pleasure. You gotta scroll for it.
Keeping in the spirit, I have added to the music player, the Pistol Annies’ “Hell on Heels” from their album of the same name. Number eight on the dial. Turn it up.
U.S. Air Force photo by Tech. Sgt. Keith Brown
words & worlds 