No Lindo Linda
I literally have zero scanned in photos of the years I lived in Germany. This is downtown Fulda where we lived during the winter.
Last night I spent a good hour or so on the phone with a dear friend I met during Jim's years of service in Germany. We had a good natter and laugh talking about our time there. But a name from the past came up I hadn't thought about in years. Linda. Not mentioning her last name because I have no clue what it might be now and it's not an uncommon name. I am sure it's not the same because I doubt she's still married to the same guy.
My friend told me about all the troubles Linda managed to stir up during her remaining time in Fulda. Who was Linda? Something of not so nice person for both of us.
Back in the late 1980s I worked at the USO in an outreach capacity. My title sounded fancier than the part time position was. Basically I was there with my basic level of social work making sure that wives settled into life in Fulda. Sometimes I was sent out when a spouse started floundering and having issues acclimating to assess the situation. Fulda was considered something of a hardship posting. It was small, and very few spoke English there.
The position was perfect for me because as soon as I arrived in Germany and brushed up on my rusty university German to figure out how to say "How much is that?" and "How much to ride to the Farmers Market" I was fine. Like here I routinely went out to explore, first on the bus, later driving. Once I had a bus schedule and my pigeon German I was off. Finding that the best fresh chicken meant getting to the farmers market early, and that ordering "Pepperoni Pizza" at the lone Italian restaurant meant a pizza covered with Italian pickled peppers. It was a beautiful place, I visited museums, ancient churches, shops and restaurants on my own. I loved to do an afternoon coffee, pastry and book reading at the cafe near the house.
The same thing has happened here. I learned quickly to catch the bus, where to shop and everything else I needed to navigate in a foreign country. Here it's been more of a challenge because the culture here is vastly different than German culture. There was less cultural shock for me, as an American raised with very European culture in South Louisiana than once we moved here. In Germany the trains ran on time and everything was handled logically. Here, not so much.
I took the position at the USO mere months after arriving. They needed someone adventurous, I needed a job because I was starting to get bored. German society in that time and place was somewhat staid and routine. There aren't many jobs available for military spouses at overseas locations unless you wait tables at the officers club. Even the positions at the PX and commissary were hotly contested for. I felt lucky to land a great job. I settled in, I liked my coworkers, I liked the job.
During my time there we were approached by NBC television to help them set up a remote live version of "The Today Show" At that time it was one of the top rated morning shows featuring Jane Pauley and Bryan Gumbel. Like the good worker bee/soldier I was I helped out. One of the segments they wanted to film was the lady that did the tours, and I as the outreach person, leading a tour group through the Fulda farmers market on a frosty cold November morning.
My coworker and I donned our navy blue USO blazers layered over enough sweaters to stay warm and out we went with the film crew. She'd personally hand picked the people with us on the filming. All Army couples that represented the average military family. No drama, drugs, drinking or weirdness. Very normal and upstanding people. We trekked around the market for an hour or so before they interviewed each of us individually.
The problem started with the interview. All the questions were very slanted towards trying to encourage us to say we were starving in the midst of plenty by getting military wages. No one would say that, most answering like I did that the military pays cost of living adjustments based upon the consumer price index in that area up or down each moth, and that with the bonuses and perks of free healthcare and other things we were all doing quite well, very comfortable.
After we wrapped the crew said because of the extreme cold of the day that we should go into the nearby coffee shop and get pastries and coffee on them, and they'd be along in a few after a few long shots of the market. We did.
Then the day of the show came along. I was there, seated right up front with my USO pals. I remember having to be there super early, so I brought along a bag of Christmas cards to address while we waited. Jim was there too, seated with some of the soldiers he'd competed with and won "Soldier of the Quarter" again. Both there and excited for this historic event days from Thanksgiving. There were very few tickets, and they mostly went out to organizations like the USO and as rewards for various things.
Imagine our surprise when they aired the piece shot at the market and instead of using any of our interviews, or the people we're set them up with the piece cut away to someone else. An awful someone else. Linda and her husband. Her and her drunken, visiting the prostitutes, gambling away their wages husband. Her trouble making threatened with having her command sponsorship pulled for bad behavior, gossiping and shit stirring ways. They were almost comically cliched in their awfulness. I'd been asked more than once to go talk to Linda, and hint she needed to behave or get booted back to the States.
Linda et al spent ten full minutes whining about starving and living in debt, even as they, like us, like everyone else, got food subsidies, cost of living adjustments, housing allowances and many other valuable benefits. They portrayed an unreality that disgraced all of us living overseas in the military that simply was not true. They never mentioned her husband blowing his entire pay getting drunk at the officer's club, or his many jaunts to the local houses of prostitution. Or her gambling trips to the local casinos. Their lack of all personal responsibility in money handling or budgeting. A cluster fuck of stupid drunken money blowing with drama and affairs.
My family saw that piece and started calling, worrying I was starving in Germany!
Well, all of us with the USO looked at each other with shocked expressions of "What the fuck did we just witness??" on our faces. Afterward we retired back to the office to discuss this, feeling bitterly betrayed by a news organization that wanted to show a warped untruth over what it was really like to live there.
I should have known when I saw Linda and family buzzing around the edges of the shoot that they'd find some way to insert themselves and their dumb drama into the piece.
My friend told me all about Linda and family drama after I left. She even tried to involve my friend and her husband into her machinations. Linda was Linda right up until they finally shipped her back stateside finally.
I moved on to more pleasant tasks during my time with the USO, like helping with the "Jeopardy" try outs in Frankfurt before quitting to have a baby.
While I have no idea where Linda is, or her name now I have a feeling that the crazy circus of chaos she brought then likely continues until now.
I do miss the beauty of Fulda, with churches going back to about the 900s, the Orangerie palace, the absolutely breathtaking medieval town center, and the farmers market.
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