I get the feeling you're not being entirely serious here. (Never mind service in the ATA was as dangerous as the regular air force, or even more so.)

ATA pilots ferried aircraft and personnel around the UK to where they were most needed, allowing the military to pretend these weren't real soldiers (they weren't allowed to fly over the English Channel to where there was actual fighting), and to acknowledge that if women wanted to be greasemonkeys so badly their strange urges could be put to good use without offending common decency. Some background for you: the Air Transport Auxiliary was a civilian organisation created by the British army during the Second World War which served as a useful way around the pesky reality that some members of the gentler sex persisted in being good at men's jobs even when they were obviously going to faint the moment they got within sniffing distance of actual combat - I mean, imagine.

The feminine touch? Like what? Kittens and pink fatigues? Thing is, they tend to lack the feminine touch if a lady gets involved in the military she's either a Katherine Bigelow fan or trying to keep up in a man's world, baby. Filmmakers have been a fan of this sort of thing for a while - from the black-and-white classic La Grande Illusion to superstar bromances like the Korean blockbuster My Way. Maybe not to the extent the Great War rewrote societal codes and strictures - you could argue that one for a while - but a lot of friendships got started that way that'd otherwise have withered on the vine. but it was pretty big on throwing people together who'd ordinarily never have met. Okay, okay, it would be a bit of a stretch to call World War II a 'meet-cute'. How about something cheerful? Like a romantic comedy? Hey! You've been going dark and edgy for the past couple of months with this column. It's like being in love, discovering your best friend.' She felt as though she were at the eye of a tropical storm. Maddie stood facing her new friend by the table they had just abandoned, people around her whirling into action. Then everybody rocketed from their borrowed church hall wooden folding chairs to meet the next battle. Every head in the room looked up in dismay and exhaustion at the canteen's pasteboard ceiling, as if they could see through it.

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