About the Show:

Incoming showcases the true stories of America’s military veterans, told in their own words, straight from their own mouths. Produced by So Say We All, a 501c3 literary and performing arts nonprofit, in collaboration with San Diego’s NPR station KPBS.

Website:

https://www.incomingradio.org

Connect:

https://www.facebook.com/incomingradio

https://www.instagram.com/sosayweallonline/

https://twitter.com/incomingradio

Email:

info@sosayweallonline.com

About the Show:

Incoming showcases the true stories of America’s military veterans, told in their own words, straight from their own mouths. Produced by So Say We All, a 501c3 literary and performing arts nonprofit, in collaboration with San Diego’s NPR station KPBS.

Website:

https://www.sosayweallonline.com/incoming/

Connect:

https://www.facebook.com/SoSayWeAllOnline

https://www.instagram.com/sosayweallonline/

https://twitter.com/Sosayweallsd

Email:

info@sosayweallonline.com

Contributors: Roy Scranton and Chef Geoff Cole

Veteran and stand-up comedian Brian Simpson talks about maintaining identity while serving in the armed forces. And veteran Dan Lopez tells the true story about smoking pot with the Taliban.

Contributors: Brian Simpson and Dan Lopez

Contributor: James Seddon.

Musical theatre composer and performer Natalie Lovejoy joins us in the second half to talk about her experiences as a young military spouse, and how she was able to tell her story and connect with others through musical theatre. First up, Navy veteran and police officer Vance Voyles talks about how the war comes back for him, in some of the calls he’s responded to as a cop.

Contributors: Vance Voyles, Natalie Lovejoy.

Contributors: Lisbeth Prifogle and Anthony Moll.

Contributors: Brian Turner and Mariah Smith

Today’s show, “Unstuck in Time,” is titled after the opening line in Kurt Vonnegut’s novel Slaughterhouse Five, one of our favorite descriptions about Post Traumatic Stress. Vonnegut uses it in reference to his main character, where he writes, “Billy Pilgrim has come unstuck in time.” Upon first reading the book, it’s natural to take it literally — the book is couched in a science-fiction veneer after all –but upon later reflection its remarkable how perfectly it explains the phenomenon of flashbacks.

Contributors: Benjamin Busch and Sierra Crane.

Friedrich Nietzsche’s quote reminds me that there are certain individuals who have unique insights about the process of staring into the abyss, as well as climbing back out of it again. We have four terrific veteran writers and artists speaking on the subject who come at it from very different angles:

Contributors: Andrew Szala, Rolf Yngve, Gill Sotu, Elizabeth Washburn and Dan Lopez of San Diego’s veteran visual arts non-profit, Combat Arts.

Contributors: Casondra Brewster, Sam Abel, Lt. Cmd. Liam Corley.

Today’s episode is titled “Lost At Sea,” for two reasons: firstly because we’ll be hearing from service members who spent a lot of their time bobbing on the water, Kurt Kalbfliesh of the Navy and Tenley Lozano of the Coast Guard, but also because their stories both touch on what they sacrificed and endured during their service that impacted the rest of their lives.

Contributors: Kurt Kalbfleisch and Tenley Lozano.

Invasion can be both psychological and literal. We’re very lucky to be able pair up two contributors who dealt with invasion and actually served together at the same time in Iraq, but from very different places. Our contributors are Francisco Martinezcuello, a mustang officer, and Sammi S., an Iraqi man who was barely a teenager when he became an interpreter for the Marine Corp., and in a very literal way was raised by them.

Contributors: Francisco Martinezcuello and Sammi S.

Today’s show is split into three parts and three different veteran writers, each focusing respectively on periods before the country went to war after 9/11, during deployment downrange in Iraq, and the aftermath after leaving the service. That’s why we’re titling today’s show, “Time is a River,” after one of my favorite quotes of all time, by the American folksinger Utah Phillips, who said, “The past doesn’t go anywhere. Time is a river, and you are standing in it.” Each part is told respectively by Army veterans Kelli Hewlett, Brooke King, and Zack Dryer, and while their experiences were wildly different, they shared a part of the same war at different points and collectively tell its story in-brief.

Contributors: Kelli Hewlett, Brooke King, Zack Dryer.

Today’s episode is titled, “Souvenirs,” which in the context of the stories you’re about to hear is a little tongue-in-cheek, a little bit of that dark humor people under stress employ from time to time to get by, but I’m sure you’ll appreciate it by the end. The gist is that what happens overseas comes home with you, and can find a way to reappear back into your life when you least expect it

Contributors: Brandon Lingle, Alex Flynn, and Brent Wingfield.

Asking so few to carry a burden so large, one that we’ve all benefited from regardless of our personal politics, is not a deal that comes without consequences. What happens during war time doesn’t end when the war ends, if the wars of our time ever end anymore. It doesn’t end when a service member comes home either, in fact coming home is often more dangerous for a lot of people than being deployed.

The transition back to the civilian world has always been a lonely one, but coming home to a place where most civilians have no idea what service members have done, and have some major misconceptions about it, makes it more so. And while not all of our veterans need help, some do.

The 22 veteran suicides that happen every day on average demonstrates that fact, a number that far outpaces the rate of casualties that have resulted from combat or accidents in the line of duty. And until all of us have some idea about who our military is and what their lives are like, we won’t know how to stop it.

So we started this program to ask questions, hear stories, and learn. Because that’s what we know how to do.

But we’re not just listening and asking questions because it’s ethically imperative; we’re listening because what they have to say is compelling, and artfully rendered, funny, poignant, surprising, and all the other things you want from good storytelling.

Some of the voices you’ll be hearing from are studied writers who want to do this for a living, and others are fascinating individuals we’ve met along the way who have a great tale to tell that we wanted to share with you. But one thing holds true for all of them and it is this: the men and women you’re going to meet are artists. Full stop. Who are also veterans. So we regarded them as such.

On behalf of all our contributors, past, present, and future, thank you for making this possible and for being our audience. The reader completes the writer, and it’s an enormous privilege to have this forum where we can all sit down and talk together at last.

Contributors: Jesse Goolsby and Adam Stone.