Invest in the Name Brand Cereal

Correct me if I'm wrong, but no sane military spouse or for that matter, family member to someone who is in the military, likes it when their soldier is deployed.

Sure, you get more money.. and sure, the laundry basket is no longer full of socks that may or may not have matched when they were on his feet, and you get to eat cereal at all times of the day instead of planning real meals.. But really, you're not truly enjoying these things.

When my soldier was deployed, I was pregnant. And maybe that's why I dealt with his deployment as well as I did... Because there wasn't a choice to not handle it well. I had to get out, get fresh air, eat well, exercise, walk around craft stores every day to find things to make to send to him... 8D

I read a lot of blogs where the spouses who are left behind are saying it's hard to get out of bed, hard to clean their house, find the will to eat. I read a lot of widowed spouses that are finding joy in the little things even though they have every right to feel like they can't get out of bed. I read a lot of blogs where rumors fly around about cheating and other...extracurricular activities that aren't so kosher when you're spouse is deployed. A lot of it makes me think and makes me proud to be a milspouse, a lot of it makes me sick.

I am a better person, a better wife, a better mother because my husband was deployed. I learned how much tolerance I have, which is entirely different then patience. I learned how much love I have, how much trust and respect are needed to get through something. I learned how much disdain I have for people who try to blame everything on the fact that their spouse is not with them right at this second.

I learned about what is trivial in my life and what I cannot live without. I learned that it's worth every single picture taken in front of a mirror, every bad Skype connection, every line at the post office you stand in to show your love for your soldier.

I learned who my real friends were, I learned that people will always say, "Why didn't you wait until you knew he was going to be home before you got pregnant?" and "Why didn't you wait until you had orders?"

I learned how to shut my mouth and walk away.

I learned how to open my mouth and disarm a bitch with one sentence...which before the deployment it might've taken me 2.

Because of all I learned.. there's some things I'd like to tell other people, but haven't really found all the right words yet. Something along the lines of, "Buy a good webcam." or... "Invest in the name brand cereal. It's worth it while he's gone."

Next Steps

The time has come to start thinking about another baby.

Oh my.

A fact nobody really wants to know: After 2 years of being menstruation-less, it is now back. Crazy how on the day I can no longer take any more ibuprofen because I've been taking such a high dosage for the last month (jaw problems), my period would return with killer cramps. Lol. True story: I was actually looking forward to this. Strange I know.. But it was sooo weird to go that long with a million hormones raging through your body and nothing to show for it once a month. Weird a lot.

So.. anyway. When we got married we discussed the usual how many children, when we would want them, all that... Which of course can change depending on careers and finances and health.. but in general we had decided that we would want whatever children we would have relatively close together. (While typing this I have a puppy trying to pull both cats around by their heads and a 14 month old daughter napping...) Relatively, meaning do the 2ish years spacing that is almost typical nowadays. That way we would also still be in the military which means we could have the good prenatal and postnatal services that the military provides. Not to mention.. a big enough house to fit us all.

We have 15 months before his ETS.. so we're really starting to consider that next baby. While we consider if we're staying in the military, what to do about school, whether or not I should go back to work.. the list goes on and on and on.

Is it easier or harder being a military family and thinking about all this stuff? We don't have to worry about our insurance, or over-high daycare prices, or housing.. or things like job security. We do have to worry about PCSing suddenly, or deployments, being away from family.

I don't even know what it'll be like to have him here while I'm pregnant. I don't know how we'll both deal with that...if he'll even enjoy that whole...being pregnant process. I don't know how I'll feel being pregnant and not being geographically close to the people who helped me so much last time.

If this was my dream world, he would reenlist for another couple years and reenlist for a new post. Maybe even change MOS's so we could get a good bonus and put some more rainy day money away.. That way he'd be staying in until he finished the degree that he wants. We could have another baby, and by the time he'd be done in the military, our oldest would be gearing up for preschool. Yep.

This is not my dream world tho.. So... for now we're just gonna keep thinking about it and discussing it.

Considerings

We're at a point where I feel comfortable putting the baby in daycare for a few hours a day. We're ok money-wise, but it'd be nice to have a little extra. So...I should go out and find a part time job, yes? I have 2 job interviews set up in the next couple days..

I dunno.. Because as I'm setting the baby up with Child and Youth Services on post so I can put her in daycare or with a babysitter, I'm finding more and more things that I'd enjoy doing with her. Like, the tumbling classes and the swim lessons and the reading hour at the library... I need open availability with my daughter but I also need open availability to work in retail part time.

So.. Do I work from home again? I've sold Avon on and off since I was 16. But..before I was doing it where I knew people, had a good customer list and so on and so forth. True, I'm pretty computer savvy and can advertise through different websites on and off post now... Sigh. The extra money would be nice. But I'm not sure if I can stay organized enough to do it all from home with the baby and now the puppy. It's something I'm seriously considering tho. There's 12 representatives in this area already...I dunno.

I'd like to have even a couple hundred bucks extra a month just to put in savings. Or so I can fly back to Colorado whenever I want.

Have I mentioned that we're buying a Beast? :) ...a car older than I am for an unbelievable good price (thank you Kit!) ..a car that'll get Jer back and forth to work and that's it for the next year.

Um...what else? TMJ stuff... finally getting (sorta) taken care of. I have dentists and doctor appointments set up for the first week of April. Jer's bosses are gonna hate me that week for taking him out of work so he can watch the baby while I'm off getting my jaw probed. I'm halfway drugging myself at night, which I absolutely hate doing but it does indeed help.

I've lost 2 pounds... since the doctors and dentists insist that I eat food that doesn't really need to be chewed, I eat a lot of ice cream. So.. that means I decided to immediately start working out, lol.

Jer's in the field on and off for a week or two right now... So, I get to be home with the puppy and baby lots and lots. ...She has two teeth coming in that I fear are killing both of us.

We're applying for a new house..a bigger house. So we'll probably be moving next month, just across post but that works for me. I don't especially care if we lived next door as long as we had some more square footage and a bigger yard.

I really need to buy a lawn mower.

My Neurosis

I feel so angry lately. I'm afraid it's something in the air here. I'm afraid of it.

But fear makes me lash out in anger so perhaps I'm more afraid of things right now then I am really angry.

Does that make sense?

I'm afraid I've been too proud to talk about everything I fear. Pride goeth before destruction, and a haughty spirit before a fall. 

There are so many changes happening with so many people I know. So many decisions that are being made across the world and so many decisions being discussed at home. 

A year ago I gladly let life happen. I am not a patient woman, I'm not even a nice woman, but a year ago I let fear and anger and doubt just leave and I just lived day by day... which was really the only way I could while I was pregnant and while the hubby was deployed. 


Sometimes I feel anxious, sometimes I get headaches, I've been diagnosed with TMJD, I have muscle spasms that rage all over my body. Sometimes I get anxious because I get a headache so I'm convinced that something's wrong with me because I'm anxious and because I have a headache, convinced that I'm going crazy. The muscle spasms...well, I've been plagued with those since I was a teenager but sometimes I wish I'd stop tingling. 


And then... I sit with my husband, he rubs my ankles. I dance with my baby...she looks like she's trying to do the worm. I walk around a bookstore. I write. And all of a sudden I'm breathing normally again. 


Times have changed, I can't go back to where I was a year ago. Not physically, mentally or geographically. But I miss that peace that I somehow managed. 

We have exactly a year to decide whether or not we're going to reenlist. That means in the next couple months we'll probably start trying to have another child, it means he'll have to figure out how much school he can complete within a year and if it's not enough should he extend his contract or reenlist? It means I should figure out how I should work my school...seriously decide whether or not to take some classes now or just wait until whatever kids we have are in school.

In this economy can we afford to get out of the military? Where at least we know we always have somewhere to live and decent health insurance for ourselves and our children...But what about deployments? ...They are inevitable.


So...anyway. 


Dear My People: I miss you. I hope you're not screwing up your lives. I wish that I could be there with you, just to talk. Just to laugh. I wish you were here to hold my hand, to read my words, to be proud of us and everything we have accomplished so far. I wish someone would tell us if they're proud of us or not.


In the mean time, I'm writing. And I will be blogging for Her War, Her Voice in the future. Since we have about 10 or more friends in the military right now (just the people from high school and college) I'll let you know if I'll be including stories about you (anonymously of course) and let you read the blog before it happens... I already have ideas. 


I'm working out. I'm painting. I'm playing with our new puppy... which makes me seriously rethink adding another child into the equation, lol.

Dear My Husband: I love you so unbelievably much. Thank you for dealing with my current neurosis and for bearing with me while I rant at you. Let's buy a piano so I can at least make pretty music while I'm venting. :)

A Military Home

Previously published in Aims Magazine :)

From outside looking in I see a house; it’s typical for this area. The shutters are painted light blue and the last blooms of potted flowers planted in the spring are just starting to droop and fade. It is an unassuming house. The lawn might be considered a little too long by the neighbors and it is starting to yellow, but in my mind it’s the perfect size and shape for this house. I imagine that in a few weeks, Jack-o-Lanterns with wide grins and triangular eyes will adorn the front step. Stepping inside the front door, this house feels different somehow. With its’ plain, cream-colored walls and sparse yet sturdy furniture, this house feels like a military home.

The main focal point in the living room is a vintage upright piano that stands lonely against one wall. It is surrounded on all sides by photos, some are old sepia-toned and cracked around the edges, living in overly ornate silver frames. Glossy with plain wooden frames, most of the pictures are full of laughter and smiles. Straight above and perfectly centered with the piano there is a framed folded American flag. It dominates the room with its bright white and blue threads. Its classic beauty seems to hold power over everyone in the house. Two black and white photos in matching cherry-wood frames stand out to me. In one there is a group of about thirty men, all standing at parade rest, their hands behind their backs and their faces stern. The other photo is a head shot of a man with light eyes that seem kind. He is grimacing into the camera as though to tell his family not to believe such a horrible picture.

It is not noticed immediately, but children do live in this home. A swing set with a green slide towers over the small backyard, used sippy cups line the kitchen counter, and next to the front door lives a miniature pair of pink sneakers that are stained with grass and mud. Yet this house seems too quiet for there to be children living in it. A walk down the hallway confirms that a young girl does indeed live here, she sit at a desk that seems too large for her, her pigtails that are tied with red ribbon bob up and down with every movement she makes…She’s writing her weekly letter, complete with crayon drawings of her favorite teddy bear, to her daddy. Unlike her baby brother who’s sleeping in the crib across the room, she remembers her dad and prays every night at bedtime that he comes home soon.

This house claims no disorder, no dust, and no clutter. There are no toys strewn about, no cat hair on the sofa and no fingerprints on the polished coffee table. The scent of this house is Pledge furniture polish, a recently burned lilac candle, Ajax cleaning powder and the underlying scent that is in essence, female—a scent that somehow means that a man hasn’t entered this house for quite some time. This type of cleanliness and organization can only come from a lonely woman. It comes from a woman who glows with strength and grace during the day, who juggles her work and children with compassion and love—the type of woman that other women come to either admire or hate. This is the woman of the house and the smudges under her eyes say that after three months of her husband being gone, she still can’t get use to sleeping alone.

When I walk out of the house I feel conflicted. I can stand on the yellowing front yard and I can know that inside that house, behind the lacy curtains at the window, lives a family controlled every day by the Army. But until I walk back in, all I can see is an ordinary house, unassuming, with pretty blue shutters and flowers in pots that are starting to fade.

The Things We Carry

I carry a past, not the people in the memories but the memories nonetheless. Secrets, some whispered and some screamed and most of them are not mine.

I carry my child. In every way possible I carry her and there are times when my arms and my heart burn from it. I get to carry all my love and hope and dreams for her, the burp cloths and the diaper bag.
And because of her I carry a future better then I ever could've imagined.

I carry an endless supply of cleaning supplies, including but not limited to: brooms, vacuums, Swiffers (wet and dry) polish, window cleaner, a whole arsenal of lysol products, Mr Clean Magic Erasers, Febreeze, and lets not forget the ever-present carpet cleaner. I wield these things daily.

I also get the joy of carrying pencils and paper, keyboard and printer. Grocery lists, bills, receipts, and budgets. All with the hope that someday there will be more of some and less of others.

I carry parts and pieces of my family. I can feel their pain and their joy, patience, and frustrations. Sometimes I can feel them reaching out across the miles to try to hold my hand. For them and for me, I carry them.

I carry my tattoos. I'm trying to make the world a more colorful place, one inch of skin at a time. With them, I remember who I was, what I believe in, what I needed, what I wanted, who I wanted to be at different places in my life. I carry them so at times when I can't remember my strength, I can look down and remember that's it somewhere inside of me.

I carry fear. And sometimes that fears sneaks up on me, reminds me that I am human and that there are alligators everywhere. I am a woman, a mother, a wife, a military spouse, and I know fear. But more, I know courage.

I carry a razor that I use, maybe once a week..if I remember. A makeup bag full of goodies that sadly is most of the time ignored. A whole lot of unbelievably pretty shoes that I haven't worn in over a year. I carry a disdain for hair curlers, a love for tweezers, and complete adoration for my hair straightener. 

I carry all I feel for my husband. The understanding that I love someone completely unlike me and that I still have no knowledge of how it works out as well as it does. I carry the apologies that I sometimes forget to say and the guilt that ensues when I have said something wrong. I carry the hope for our future and our child's future. I get to carry my support for him. I carry his fears and doubts that bind with mine just as our future is bound. I get to share the weight of deployment, redeployment, transition, and the fear for our friends and family going through the same things.

I carry my dreams.  Our dreams. Not that the world will be a better place really, but that we'll be able to make our place in the world; a place where we can feel safe, content, and where we can keep dreaming. Where we can teach our babies what it's like to have dreams, how to make some come true, how to let go of others and how to decide, how to work those dreams.