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# DLA Land and Maritime employee spotlight: Jason Dutton

By Cindy PrayDLA Land and Maritime Public Affairs

                COLUMBUS, Ohio  –              
Jason Dutton is a customer account specialist for Defense Logistics Agency Land and Maritime. While he describes his career as fulfilling and rewarding, it isn’t his only success. When not working, Dutton can be found immersed in his own imagination creating “joyful worlds in which he’d love to live.” Now, he is sharing that joy with the recent publication of his first novel, “How to Dance.”

Dutton has been a lover of books for as long as he can remember.

“I grew up reading mysteries from a very young age,” he said. “I remember the excitement every time my mom managed to locate another one of the blue hardback Hardy Boys stories that I hadn’t yet read.”

His admiration for reading quickly grew into a desire to create his own worlds through writing. In third grade, he wrote a mystery story that won him the opportunity to attend a nearby young author’s conference. It was just the beginning of his writing journey.

Dutton continued to nurture his passion and hone his writing skills into adulthood. In college, he majored in creative writing and political science and graduated from Ashland University in 2005.

It was “by accident,” he said, that he began a career in federal service two years later.

“I was looking for jobs and a friend of a friend who worked at [DLA Land and Maritime] told me about open positions,” he said. “I wasn’t seeking a government position, but it’s been great and I’m glad I’m here.”

Dutton came through DLA Land and Maritime’s Pathways to Career Excellence program in 2007. He works for the Army Industrial team supporting the Anniston Army Depot and several National Guard units. As a customer account specialist, he is a point of contact for customer requests for information or action, ensuring the delivery of critical items.

Balancing writing with a full-time job can be difficult at times, he said, but DLA Land and Maritime has been supportive with time off and flexible scheduling, which he added was helpful when writing his thesis in 2010 for his master’s degree.

“It comes down to being disciplined with your schedule,” Dutton said. “Everyone has the same 24 hours in a day – it’s how you choose to spend that time. I firmly believe that the way we spend our time is a reflection of our priorities.”

For Dutton, writing is a priority. He has written numerous nonfiction pieces about his disability, cerebral palsy, but said his true passion is writing about relationships and how people interact with one another.

The inspiration for his first novel came from a movie preview he saw about a love story between a disabled man and an able-bodied woman.

“When I found out the story concluded with the disabled man choosing suicide, I felt compelled to write about the experience of choosing to live with a disability,” he said.

Dutton describes the overarching theme for his book and much of his writing as a reflection of his outlook on life.

“There’s always joy and there’s always pain – you get to choose where to look,” he said. “I want my writing to convey joy because that is what I choose to seek and live, and I carry that into every aspect of my life.”

Dutton plans to continue writing with hopes of publishing more books. For now, he is relishing in the joy he’s created with this one.

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DLA Land and Maritimecustomer account specialistEmployee SpotlightJason Dutton