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Love in Condition Yellow: A Memoir of an Unlikely Marriage

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I loved this book! Memoirs are hard - and Sophia Raday has written an engaging one that feels complex enough to keep a reader intrigued even if they didn't directly relate to her experience. Interweaving politics, romance, love, marriage, setting, and history, I felt she added depth and weight to what has the potential to be the most flyaway of topics - "this is how we fell in love". There are so many ways in which her story can be relevant to a myriad of readers. I find her writing to be introspective without being narcissistic and particularly enjoyed the structure of the chapters - each with its appropriate reference lead-in. I definitely recommend it and would read it again.

Love weaves an unlikely path in this beautifully written story. A truly honest exposure of the heart and a naked view of the complexity of marriage and relationships. It made me look at my own weaknesses and preconceived ideals and see a tapestry that I was not expecting. I could not put this book down and am anxiously waiting for another book by Raday. Bravo.

The cover of this book says it all: a pair of combat boots next to a pair of sandals. Sophia Raday, feminist activists, meets and ultimately marries Barrett McAllister, who's all elements of the right wing combined into one terrific guy: West Point grad, Ranger, infantry Army officer, and Oakland police officer.

Somehow Sophia connects with Barrett and most of the book is about how they make their differences work. Sophia enters a foreign culture while living at Fort Carlisle while Barrett attends Army War College. He's honored to be invited while her friends gasp, "War College? What's the point?" Meanwhile Barrett feels alien in Berkeley, where he won't stop at a grocery store in his uniform on the way home from work.

The first part of the book was a little exasperating as Raday reviewed her breakup with Nathan. As she introduces, her strong writing keeps the book from degenerating into a cliche. After all, stories of opposites are hardly new; for instance, we've had many memoirs and even sitcoms of city women who moved to a farm and interfaith marriages.

Sophia and Barrett maintain their belief systems yet come together as a family. It's more like a couple who come from different religions and maintain separate belief systems. In fact, Sophia uses her belief systems, such as her Buddhist readings and her Nia dance class, to deal with the differences.

I was a little surprised that Sophia doesn't encounter even one soulmate from Barrett's world. Of course, most of the time she remains in Berkeley with her old friends. At Carlisle, she describes a homophobic Colonel and wives who are warm and friendly but solidly Republican and pro-war.

By way of contrast, I would recommend Elizabeth Samet's book, A Soldier's Heart. Samet describes some very sensitive soldiers, includingt a few who carried poetry into the war. I also liked Standing By, by a woman who married a Naval officer. Books like these give a more diverse view of the military.

Less directly, Saday raises the question of what gets sacrificed in a marriage and how each partner honors the other's goals. Barrett willingly entered marriage counseling and participated enthusiastically. Sophia supported his decision to go to Army War College and accept a high-status police job, even though she wanted him to spend more time at home. She didn't seem like the whiny, self-centered type. Barrett in turn encourages her to pursue her writing dream. Most readers will be glad she did.

Sophia Raday didn't intend to fall in love with her husband. She went on a blind date with him on a lark, figuring that a hippie like her and a Republican cop like him would be like oil and water. One date turned into another, then another, and... love! Raday is an entertaining writer, and her book reveals how even squishy liberals can be hardheaded while tough conservatives can be softer than you think.

Marriage memoirs are difficult to write. It's a tough balance: the writer has to tell both sides of the story, and tell them fairly and in a balanced way. And marriages are anything but fair and balanced, as you know if you've been married. The writer (in this case the wife) has to dig deep into the secret places of her own heart, mind, and body to find truths that are hers; and also undertake a similar excavation in the heart, mind, and body of her partner. It's a challenging proposition.

And this marriage--oh, my! A marriage between Sophia, an idealistic peacenik, an anti-nuclear protester, a confirmed Democrat, and a dope-smoking hippie--and Barrett, a super-realist who is a by-the-book West Point graduate, an Airborne Ranger, an Oakland cop, and an officer in the Army Reserve. Their breakfast choices at Lois the Pie Queen tells the story: Barrett orders the Reggie Jackson special (steak and eggs) while Sophia orders the tofu scramble and grits. Recipe for domestic trouble? You bet. But while this does indeed seem an unlikely marriage (as it must have to the families and friends of the bride and groom), Love in Condition Yellow shows us a marriage in which both partners appear to work as hard as they can to keep their lives on an even keel, even after the jolt of 9/11, Barrett's recall to duty, and Sophia discovery that she has become a military wife.

The storyline of this unusual narrative (traced in such martial chapter titles as "Spark," "Constructive Engagement," and "Hearts and Minds") is urgent and insistent enough to carry the reader through the book. But what is really compelling and vivid about this memoir are the characters themselves: the woman who insists on looking deeply into her own conflicts as she studies--in an amazingly conscious and thoughtful way--the conflicts within herself; and the man she has come to love, with all his own conflicts and contradictions, and his efforts to reconcile personal desire with professional and patriotic duty. Through these characters, we come to understand that love doesn't mean "trying to make yourselves into a matched set" and that even passionate, deeply held differences of opinion don't have to tear committed partners apart. We're given a privileged look into the often barricaded world of the military family, where danger waits at the doorstep but where there are important lessons of self-reliance and inner strength to be learned. And we see in a single marriage a microcosm of the differences we all have to work out in our own hearts and lives, if the union of our nation is to be saved.

This is a brave book, because it dares to reveal so much of the internal workings of a very private and extraordinarily complex relationship--revelations that took far more courage than we have any right to require of a memoirist. It is a lyrical book, with artful, attention-getting images ("a wilted smile," a mouth "pulled together like a stitched scar," the "rush hour traffic of my thoughts"). And it's also a funny book that makes you smile while you swallow down the hurt.

Altogether, Love in Condition Yellow is a remarkable memoir. I hope you will read it, whatever your take on nuclear threat, excessive police force, legalized marijuana, and the war in Iraq. You'll be surprised. And glad.

by Susan Wittig Albert
for Story Circle Book Reviews
reviewing books by, for, and about women

This is a beautifully-written, engaging, honest look at what happened when Raday, a Stanford-educated Berkeley resident and peace activist, found herself falling in love with someone from a far different social and political world: a Republican police officer in the Army reserve. Their story speaks to anyone who is trying to understand the "other side", anyone who is trying to build a bridge of communication toward those with different viewpoints. I've read this book several times now and each time I find myself pausing on a different passage which has made me laugh or cry. It's a wonderfully timely love story, and a thought-provoking book to share.

I loved this book! I practically inhaled it -- I read it in under 48 hours and passed it on to two other friends who did the same. The very premise is so provocative that it begs for further discussion after reading. It's led to a number of great conversations about what it means to be "patriotic" and "political" and how our (often self-righteous) preconceived notions of the "other" can blind us to the commonalities we often share. This would be a great pick for a book group!

I had my doubts as memoirs can get very boring. However, Sophia's writing style is one that swept me away immediately, and I enjoyed every minute sharing her life and relationship. Beautifully written, I hope for future books by this author.

Thank you to Sophia Raday for a beautifully written book that exemplifies the sort of generative bridge-building we need in our society these days. Though it is her own most intimate relationship she explores (with a depth of honesty that allowed me to make more sense of my own cycles in relationship), what she illustrates is the paradox of heartfelt human connection in the midst huge philosophical divides. If we could learn to sustain that closeness that she and her husband maintain despite their deep differences in other territories in life, we would have mastered the art of generative conflict.

The book was especially moving to me as I have felt the primitive fear that comes up when we feel we are "the other" in a group -- having been a conservative among liberals at one point and a liberal among conservatives at another. Besides being a wonderful read, Love in Condition Yellow shows how simple day to day acts of generosity help us thrive -- without letting us off the hook for wrestling with our convictions and values on a grander scale.

'Opposites attract' - this proverb proves itself true in so many strange ways. "Love in Condition Yellow: A Memoir of an Unlikely Marriage" tells the tale of two opposites, a free-spirited political activist familiar with cops in riot gear, and a poster boy for what a good cop should be. Their relationship is unique; as their love grows closer, America drives itself further apart. "Love in Condition Yellow" is sure to please many a reader looking for a work of true romance.