Victoria Kelly's Journey Through the Storms of Military Spousal Challenges and Artistic Triumphs

Jerry: 0:15

Welcome to today's episode of Enduring the Badge Podcast. I'm host Jerry Dean Lund and if you haven't already done so, please take out your phone and hit that subscribe button. I don't want you to miss an upcoming episode. And hey, while your phone's out, please give us a rating and review. On whichever platform you listen to this podcast on, such as iTunes, apple Podcasts and Spotify. It helps this podcast grow and the reason why, when this gets positive ratings and reviews, those platforms like Apple Podcasts and Spotify show this to other people that never listened to this podcast before, and that allows our podcast to grow and make a more of an impact on other people's lives. So if you would do that, I would appreciate that from the bottom of my heart. My very special guest today is Victoria Kelly. How are you doing, victoria?

Victoria: 0:57

Hi, good. Thank you so much for having me on. I'm really excited.

Jerry: 1:00

Yeah, thank you for taking the time to be on. Can you introduce yourself to the audience?

Victoria: 1:07

Yeah, so I'm Victoria Kelly. I'm an author and I am the author of the new book Homefront, which is coming out with the University of Nevada Press this month, and I am also a veteran spouse. I am the wife of a Marine and also spent 10 years as an active duty spouse of a Navy fighter pilot. So I've been in the military community for a really long time and there's been a lot of great things, a lot of challenges, but I just am really appreciative that I get to write about it and share some of these stories with people.

Jerry: 1:51

Yeah, I definitely am sure there's been lots of challenges in that type of life where you're probably moving around a lot and the deployments and I can imagine just be very challenging. What were some of the greatest challenges that you faced during these times?

Victoria: 2:09

I mean, I think honestly it was just the struggle of connecting with so many coming, so much coming and going. I mean there were deployments. My husband spent three years of deployments, two of them back to back, right after our daughters were born. So that was hard and ultimately the marriage did not work out, probably because of that kind of time away and all that. You know, you become kind of unfamiliar with each other. But today, thankfully, we're good friends. He transitioned to the Navy Reserve and a few years later I met my current husband, who was a sniper platoon commander in Ramadi in 2004. And I think we really bonded over our shared background and kind of that kind of understanding. So yeah, so I think the challenges are definitely dealing with not just the moves but the training periods, you know, the lead-ups to the deployment. It's actually not like nine months to a year, it's, you know, it's several years really of it. So I think some people don't even realize that outside of the community that it involves so much more than just the deployment itself. But I loved my time in the military community. It was just the best camaraderie. I met so many wonderful people who I'm still friends with today, and so I really appreciated it.

Jerry: 3:50

Good that struggle of trying to stay connected during those long periods of deployments or leading up to deployments and I'm sure there's just a lot of stress and tension in the home during those periods how did you get through that?

Victoria: 4:08

I mean, I think I turned to faith. Personally, I think my husband at the time rejected faith and that was a huge kind of issue because we weren't really able to use that to get through it. And it's funny because, reflecting back on those years, he you know, he completely you know admits that you know that he wished he had been able to do that at the time. I think sometimes military service just makes you kind of question everything you believe, and so I was able to get through it with that element.

Jerry: 4:49

Yeah, I could see how you could turn either way. Right, you could turn ports or away from it, and if one of you or if you're in a different past, that's got to be very difficult to stay connected.

Victoria: 5:03

Yeah, yeah, I think a lot of people experience that.

Jerry: 5:07

Yeah, and so then the military, did you move around a lot?

Victoria: 5:12

We did. Let's say, florida, mississippi, virginia Beach and then Washington DC, and today I live in Maryland. Okay, yeah, so not as many moves as some people, but enough.

Jerry: 5:27

Yeah, yeah, and then you have children, right.

Victoria: 5:31

I do. I have two daughters from my first marriage and I had a one-year-old from my current marriage and I have two staff kids. So we have five kids in the house and it's really fun.

Jerry: 5:44

Yeah, nice. How did your kids handle all this going on?

Victoria: 5:51

Luckily they were really young. The funniest story is we during one of the deployments I had, my daughters were one and two and we had a hurricane come through Virginia Beach which completely flooded our house and it was about an eight-month renovation period, just gutting the entire home. So we lived in a hotel, me and the girls, and I was trying to kind of manage this renovation by myself and having the kids and I think it was actually kind of an adventure and they really had no idea because they were so young. So we just kind of made it fun. We were living in one room together. So thankfully they don't have any bad memories at all. They just kind of remember the stories that I tell.

Jerry: 6:45

Yeah, that takes a strong person to be at home and keep the family together during these times. What advice do you have for listeners out there that may be going through something similar with deployments, of military deployments, and then you have the wildland deployments that will be coming up here soon. What advice do you have?

Victoria: 7:09

I think communicating is really important and kind of finding a common ground somewhere on how you're going to handle it. Like what does that communication look like? And I think the other part is like it takes two people so you both have to be really invested and honestly, I think that's the most important part is just being on the same page.

Jerry: 7:35

Yeah, how do you stay invested when your communication is probably short or long periods of time without communication? How do you stay invested in a relationship?

Victoria: 7:48

Actually, I think probably the best way to stay invested is to kind of focus on yourself a little bit during that time, instead of dwelling on the separation. During the first deployment, this was before I had kids. That's when I wrote my first book, which is called when the Men Go Off to War, and it's a poetry collection that was published by the Naval Institute Press. And so I spent that whole year. I took some poetry workshops, I did a lot of reading. I just explored a lot of new things and I really enjoyed that time. So it's just, oh, I trained for a half marathon, so I was doing a lot of things that I had always wanted to do, and then that way you're not kind of ruminating on the sad parts.

Jerry: 8:39

Yeah, yeah, I could see how staying busy would definitely be helpful. It sounds like you have this time where you could explore these things that you probably had built up inside, like I want to do this, I want to do that, but just not the time when you're in a relationship, right, so to speak? On a day-to-day basis, you could maybe fit it in and put it together.

Victoria: 9:00

Yeah, exactly, and I did write. I mean, I wrote an email. We were able to email, so I wrote an email. Actually, I wrote an email and I sent a card every day that would kind of arrive in bulk. So I was doing that and I just made a commitment to do that and then, once you kind of set that goal, you'll follow through, if you kind of stayed ahead of time.

Jerry: 9:25

Yeah, did you know you wanted to write?

Victoria: 9:28

I did, yeah, I am. So I got my MFA from the Iowa Writers Workshop right before I got married and so I always wanted to write. But I was actually working on a novel when I kind of shifted to poetry and pursued that for a little while. And then I went back to fiction and published two more books. Fiction there was a novel called Mrs Houdini it's a historical fiction novel and then my current book, homefront, is a short story collection.

Jerry: 10:00

And the last book, the short story collection, are those fiction or nonfiction.

Victoria: 10:05

Fiction, so it's based on a lot of real things. I wouldn't say the experiences are real or the characters, but it's based on the places that I was living. It's based on kind of the, I would say experiences in general that military spouses face, and so it's fiction. But obviously all fiction comes in some way from real life.

Jerry: 10:32

So there's a lot of inspiration behind it. Yeah, Was your husband like? He's like, what are you doing? Did he know you wanted to do these things while he was gone?

Victoria: 10:43

Yeah, he was always really supportive and yeah, I'm really lucky about that. Yeah, he was always super supportive and still is his family very supportive too, and my current husband, so I'm really fortunate about that. And it was a great way as we were kind of unsure if we were going to be moving, you know, and I was able to write and I was teaching at a university part time as well, but it kind of gave me a little bit of the more freedom to focus on that versus like jumping into another career at the time.

Jerry: 11:21

Yeah, that would be. That's great. You got to have that time to work on your passion and to do these things. What was your favorite out of the different books that you wrote? What was your favorite?

Victoria: 11:36

I actually think this one's my favorite because this one is I wrote these stories over almost 10 years, so this one has been in the background for a while. So to see it come out is just really exciting and it kind of touches on periods in my life over many years, so I'm able to kind of like see my evolution of you know, my experiences, the ups and downs and all of that.

Jerry: 12:06

So, yeah, I'm just really excited about it 10 years to write this, that's I mean that's a long time to say dedicated to do that.

Victoria: 12:21

Yeah, I mean, I wasn't only doing that, I was doing so many other things too. I was working on other books and other projects, and then for the past five years I've had a full-time career in PR and communication. So I'm doing that too, and then now with five kids, and so it's definitely like something that I would keep going back to. But no, if I sat down full-time and worked, over 10 years I probably would have gone crazy.

Jerry: 12:51

Even just to have it just sitting there, like to know that you're like I have this collection and I'm like slowly contributing to it. I mean, this still takes a high level of education just to like I'm going to finish this with its 10 years five years, you know, down the road to keep them back to work on it.

Victoria: 13:10

Yeah, and a lot of times with them, with short stories, you send them out to literary journals and get them published individually too. So I was sending them out, which that's such a long process. So almost all of the stories were previously published in different literary journals and then so you'll see that with a lot of fiction collections, where you know these stories appeared in whatever publication, and so I think gathering that kind of history for the stories was important to the process of making it into a book and publishing it. So I think that also was what took so long.

Jerry: 13:50

Yeah, You're. You have five kids now. You have been working full-time for five years. Where do you find the time to still write and do these things that you enjoy?

Victoria: 14:06

It's definitely harder than it was in those early years. I kind of had all these days open, but no, I do it like evenings, weekends, like lunch hour. I think the hardest part isn't necessarily finding like time, it's finding longer chunks of time. That's the hardest thing, because you get in the zone and then sometimes it takes like an hour just to get in the zone and then you know like if you have to stop, that could be hard.

Jerry: 14:34

Yeah, talking about that zone, what does that look like to be in the writing zone?

Victoria: 14:43

I read a lot to kind of get to that place. So I read a lot of, I read every. I read a lot of poetry, fiction, nonfiction and you know. So that definitely helps. And then you know, sometimes it's writing new stuff, sometimes it's going back and like cutting out stuff that just doesn't sound good anymore. So but I think the best way to get into a zone is silence. Having quiet is super important for me and then reading, just kind of flipping through like some of my favorite books and just absorbing it. That's why I especially love reading poetry, because you get kind of like the emotional sense of things so you're not really, you know, getting into a story as much as like the language itself. So I love playing with language, I love lyrical writing and just all of that. So it's fun for me.

Jerry: 15:42

Yeah it comes coming from. I'm like gosh, this is like seems so hard, you know to do like I'm not a writer. I do have like kind of an outline of a book that I'm, that I'm working on and stuff like that. But I admired the people that can just sit down at the computer and just let things flow out. I just haven't found that being a way to get into that kind of zone to do that.

Victoria: 16:09

Yet Honestly, like I don't know if that's good to know, I won't be looking for that and the people who say it does. I don't know if I believe it, but I think it's hard all the time. But like you know it's, it's easier for some. Like I couldn't you know I was never a math person, I was never a science person. Like I couldn't get like I, you know I really had to work hard on those subjects. So I think sometimes you're it's just like your brain is set to do different things.

Jerry: 16:43

Yeah, do you feel like everybody has like a maybe a book or a story in them?

Victoria: 16:51

I definitely think so. A lot of what I do in my like day job is I help people write books or, you know, help them find their stories and figure out how they want to tell them in different ways. And there are so many people out there who have a book in them and maybe that's not like sitting down and writing it by themselves, like maybe that's getting a co writer, or or maybe it's not even like a book. It could be a video or a song. You know a song like there's so many ways to tell stories, especially now you can do, I mean, this podcast. You know like you can get your story out in so many ways, I think, unless you love like the written word, you know it's great to explore other things. I don't think I would be very good at, you know, video, or I'm not the best public speaker, so that's like not funny, but I can sit down and type something. So, yeah, I think everybody has something, though.

Jerry: 17:52

Yeah, I do too. I talk to people about coming on the podcast and they're like, well, I don't have a story. And I'm like I promise you you have a story. My life's boring. I promise I don't have a story and I'm like, okay, well, let's just have, let's just talk about it a little bit. I'm like, oh see, you do have a story, because everybody that I've talked to has overcome something, some challenges.

Victoria: 18:15

And some people maybe they don't have the end yet and that's why they think you know, that they, maybe they're sitting through it and then it's hard to see, and so you're on the other side. That it's something.

Jerry: 18:26

Yeah, yeah, that's definitely true. I have not thought about it that way. Victoria, what other advice would you give, like military spouses you know, to you know to stay tight and hang on to the family. You know, during these times, that we haven't talked about.

Victoria: 18:45

I think, you know, I think being creative is a really good outlet, and then that's also great because you can share what you create with your spouse to, so whether that's like writing a poem or you know, doing something like that or a piece of art, and then you know you can send that to them or what you know, I think that's actually kind of a cool, interesting way to communicate. When you're like, what else do I have to say yeah yeah. One of the organizations that I volunteered with for several years is the Armed Services Arts Partnership, and I'm actually donating part of the royalties from the book to them. They give free comedy and creative writing classes to veterans, military and spouses, so that's actually like a great way for people to pursue those creative outlets. They do Zoom classes and in-person classes in DC, and so I just think that's an awesome way to you know kind of get started, like if people don't know where to start.

Jerry: 19:53

Yeah, I kind of like what you said. I thought that would be pretty neat if you were being deployed somewhere and then this artwork or poem arrived, or something you know, to that you could read that's super personal.

Victoria: 20:09

Yeah, I like it. It means so much more than like today I got takeout, you know, so you know it was so much more than today, like you had a really boring day. You know what are you gonna say I miss you a million times, you know. So that's kind of a fun thing to do.

Jerry: 20:29

Yeah, so you did. Did you send artwork and poetry when he was deployed?

Victoria: 20:35

I did send some of the poems. I'm not the greatest artist. I actually took a drawing class, I think, during that first deployment, cause I just think it's really interesting, but I don't think anything I had was that great. I didn't send it.

Jerry: 20:49

You like your baby Truist stick figure of you. This is yeah, Kelly. Where are I keep saying Kelly and Victoria? It's like two first names in Utah it's like ah. How can people learn more about you and what you're doing?

Victoria: 21:08

So I have a website. It's victoria-kellycom. My books are on Amazon. It's the best place to find them, but you can kind of find them anywhere BarnesandNoblecom. And yeah, I mean honestly, those are the best places to go to find out what's new. And if I'm doing events and things like that, I do like book clubs, you know so, like military spouses, they have a book club or something. I do those too.

Jerry: 21:39

Are you on social media as well?

Victoria: 21:42

I am. I'm also on Instagram at Victoria Kelly Books, so I'm trying to be as active as I can on that. Sometimes it's hard every day to get on there, but I'm trying.

Jerry: 21:55

It is really rough, I think, to maintain a good social media president. It takes a lot of time.

Victoria: 22:04

It really does. Yeah, it's an art form.

Jerry: 22:09

Yeah, for sure, I'd never really looked at it that way before. But yeah, it's definitely an art form and some people just have the knack for it and some don't. And kind of a lot of times what you see on social media is like the final product is that it could be like eight or 10 different times Someone tried to film something, to do it. At least that's what happens to me. I say something and I'm like I don't like the way that sounds and I said I don't like that, or I screw up somewhere in the middle. You know, it's just like yeah.

Victoria: 22:35

Yeah it's definitely difficult.

Jerry: 22:39

Kelly, do you have any last pieces of advice for someone to stay connected to their loved one when they're missing them and they're distance away?

Victoria: 22:52

I think just being active in community is important the military and the veteran community. They just have so many great ways to become involved with other people and so even if you're not with a spouse, like you can be with that community still. I know like one of the great veteran resources is an organization called Mission Role Call where they advocate for veterans issues on Capitol Hill. There's so many military spouse Facebook groups, podcasts and then also like just the you know the units always have their own you know social events and things like that. So I like I made it a rule to never say they know to those. So I always went, even if you don't feel like it, you feel so much better when you go and it keeps you feeling like in touch with even your spouse, even when they're away. It kind of keeps you kind of feeling less lonely. So that's important.

Jerry: 24:01

Do you like, as time has gone on and you know kind of just generations have shifted and stuff like that, have you seen people more, be more engaged into wanting to do those things, or do you feel like people are withdrawing and just kind of want to stay in their houses or wherever they're living and just not be active out there?

Victoria: 24:20

I think there's so much more on social media now. I mean, back, let's see, when I got married, it was 2009. So that was there was social media, but it wasn't the way it is now. It wasn't like a place where people spent a whole lot of time at that point. So I think there's just more opportunity now, but I don't think the number of in-person events like around military bases has gone down. I mean, I think that's always gonna be really important.

Jerry: 24:50

Yeah, I think it's tough if you take the stance of just like I don't want to be involved in the community, I just kind of want to stay at home and do my own thing, because I think that can lead to a lot of depression. I think when you're depressed and your person is gone, that makes things difficult both for you and for them. So the best thing I'm hearing for you is just get out and stay connected into that community.

Victoria: 25:18

Yeah, exactly, and don't be yourself up if you do feel down, because like it's gonna happen, like at times it's normal, so but I found that to be the best way. If I stay at home for too long, it's too much thinking. Yeah, yeah.

Jerry: 25:38

Right, yeah, you're alone and you do. What else you have to do other than think about things, and you can only numb your brain with TV and social media and other activities that are probably not meaningful as getting out and staying connected into the community, because that community wants to be connected to you and we, as humans, need to be connected to a community to thrive.

Victoria: 26:05

Yeah, exactly no, it's so important. I think that's one of the most important things for people at home.

Jerry: 26:14

Yeah, don't isolate yourselves away.

Victoria: 26:17

Right, exactly.

Jerry: 26:19

Well, victoria. Thank you so much for being on today. I really appreciate your time and writings and that's exciting to have those different books and different forms of them for people to read.

Victoria: 26:32

Thank you so much for having me and just appreciate what you're doing and all the people you're reaching.

Jerry: 26:40

Yeah, yeah, thank you so much for being on today. Thanks again for listening. Don't forget to rate and review the show wherever you access your podcast. If you know someone that would be great on the show, please get ahold of our host, jerry Dean Lund, through the Instagram handles at Jerry Fire and Fuel or at Enduring the Badge Podcast, also by visiting the show's website, enduringthebadgepodcastcom for additional methods of contact and up-to-date information regarding the show. Remember, the views and opinions expressed during the show solely represent those of our host and the current episode's guests.