His journey begins today!!!!

Oh Ma'Gwad Oh Ma'Gwad Oh Ma'Gwad Oh Ma'Gwad Oh Ma'Gwad Oh Ma'Gwad Oh Ma'Gwad Oh Ma'Gwad Oh Ma'Gwad Oh Ma'Gwad Oh Ma'Gwad Oh Ma'Gwad.

It's 3 days until he gets here and I am so so so sooooooooo excited.  It's an intense gitty feeling like before the first day of school.  Maybe not everyone thinks this way, but I did.  I remember having all my new school clothes and supplies all layed out in my room.  Deciding which outfit to wear and what order the folders were to go in my off-brand Trapper-style Keeper.  Just like now, I had all these plans and ideas of how things were going to go.  Visions of how I wanted things to happen.  At least with age I'm able to accept that my dream scenario and what will actually happen aren't necessarily going to meet.

Time is moving sooo sssllloowwwlllyy.  I woke-up this morning and I could swear it was Wednesday at least.  But alas, it is not and will not be, for a whole 'nother day.  It's good.  Things aren't quite ready for him to be here.  I want everything to be perfect.  I've been nesting like crazy in my apartment.  Scrubbing and rescrubbing every little thing, I bought a new vacuum cleaner and have been vacuuming the 50 sq ft of visible carpet in my apartment everyday, making lists of things that still need to be done and things that he might need.  You'd think the pope was coming to stay with me.

The new vacuum cleaner.

On top of that there's all the stuff I'm doing to myself.  Mani-pedi of course.  Because the first thing that a man coming from a war zone will notice is weather or not my nails are painted.  Waxings of various kinds, facials, lotions, exfoliations, etc etc etc.  There's the dieting--by dieting I really mean the attempt to avoid food all together (Mind you, I'm totally eating.  I just avoid it when I can.)  Half to try to look dehydrated and gaunt (men dig that right?) and half because I'm just too nervous to eat and the closer he gets the more nervous I get.  I'm also kicking it up in the working out department.  In general, I'm a work out 4 days a week kind of gal but lately it's been ratcheted-up.  I just want to be able to keep up with him.  He's had six months of nothing but working, reading, movies, and working out.  He's gotten himself ripped where as before he was quilted, like me.  On top of all the prep there is the general wigging out that I've been doing.  Which I think is okay.  I was having drinks with some friends last night and one said that if I wasn't freaking out she'd think something was really wrong with me.

Still don't know exactly when he'll be here but I will know soon.

Tooele Transcript Bulletin - Tooele loses first soldier in war

Tooele Transcript Bulletin - Tooele loses first soldier in war

I didn't know this guy but he's from back home.  A year ago I might have read this and thought; "Sad." and moved on.  I still will move on but now he seems real.  His death sticks to me.  Funny the change a little perspective will give you. I think about death a bit but this is the first guy from back home to die in the war.  Somehow that surprises me and gives me comfort.  So many go, but so many more come back.

My thoughts tonight are with his wife.

They also serve who only stand and wait.

Had an interesting discussion with one of my regular guests at work.  It was all about the military and deployment so I thought I would share it with all of you.  

First a little background.  Mr. D (I'm going to call him that because there's no reason to use his real name) is a middle-aged man with whom I have many good conversations.  He works upstairs from the restaurant and comes down for drinks several times a week.  When he was a young man he was set to be drafted into the Vietnam war but as luck would bless him, his number never came up.  

As most of my regular customers know Craig will be here very soon.  I pretty much tell everyone everyday, how many days are left until I'll see him.  Eight, by the way.  I was talking to him and another man and Mr D said something that seemed to stick to me.  He said that he thought the mid-tour leave seemed like torture.  He thought that it must be traumatic for these men/women to come home and get a taste of normal only to be sent back.  I quickly disagreed with him.  I said that the real torture is the thought that the end would be so far into the horizon.  At least, with it broken up like this, it feels more manageable.  Especially for those that have done this multiple times.  He told me that in Vietnam the men would be sent for the whole year.  He thought that that was more humane.  He said that if it were him he'd rather it that way.  But the men in Vietnam weren't volunteers and when they were done with there tour they were done, period.  And they didn't have men on their third, fourth, fifth tours.  There is just a huge difference between then and now.  

I guess I just see it too much from my perspective.  And that makes me think that maybe the mid-tour leave isn't for them.  Maybe it's really for us.  The wives and girlfriends and mothers and dads and everyone else that isn't made for all of this.  Craig is strong.  Stronger than I even understand.  I'm sure that if the army told him that he would be gone for a year without leave he could do it without thinking twice.  But I don't think that I could.  I don't think I could make it until next March if I didn't know he'd be here in eight days.  Because it's not just the separation, it's all the ideas that are the only thing you have to hold on to.  Aside from the separation there is SO MUCH FEAR.  Sometimes it feels like being told that some I love has a deadly disease.  There's nothing I can do but hope and support and try to find the silver lining.  But I know that no matter how much I hope there is always the chance that I'll get a call one day telling me that it's all over.  That he didn't make it.  It makes me feel so completely powerless.  I know that no matter how bad it is for me he's the one that's in danger and I am safe at home writing about it.  But I still envy his ability to take action and steer his fate.  If he didn't come back I would be crushed.  My life would be changed and there is NOTHING I CAN DO ABOUT IT. 

There I go thinking too much again.  Eight days.  It's so close.  I really am happy and excited.

"Approximately", that's army for; "whenever".

Something I didn't know and still don't understand about the army is how they handle travel arrangements.  At least for the one guy I know.  While Craig was in the states travel was mildly straight forward.  I remember he had to fly to Denver for some Run-fastest/stand-straightest solider contest.  As I recall, all that needed to be done was to book a flight.  There was a certain amount of red tape but nothing like the adventure he's had getting to and now coming back from Afghanistan.  I understand that Denver and Afghanistan are a few miles away from one another but somehow I can't wrap my head around the fact that an organization that prides itself on organization and discipline can so often be wishy-washy and haphazard.

When I say approximately 10 days I mean just that.  I don't know when he's actually arriving.  Nor does he.  Nor will he.  For hours or even days into his trip he will not know when he might reach his final destination.  He calls it; "Hitchhiking on Uncle Sam's dime."  I call it crazy with a backwards K. (Sadly I lack the compy to actually spell it that way).  So he leaves on the 19th and could arrive home anytime between then and the 24th.  It was the same getting there for him.  On the first leg of his trip they told him to hang out in an air force hanger.  Literally, hang out.  They had no idea when a flight might be going and he needed to be ready at a moments notice.  Then the army shuffled him from place to place, finally leaving him stranded in Kuwait.  I called it Kuwait-ing (as opposed to what he does now which is Afghanistan-ding around).  In the end he, quite literally, had to hitchhike to Afghanistan.  Thumbing rides from one place to the next on military transport making his way slowly to his base.  I wonder what they did during past wars, shuffle man after man on a train and hope they get to the right place?  Military precision is a joke.  I don't know, maybe I shouldn't speak in generalities.  I know very little beyond my own experience on this subject.  But I digress.  I'm so happy and excited that a few days plus or minus mean very little.  I have so many things planned, dear reader.  I will write about all of them.  But for now that is all.  I will probably write again before he arrives.  Hopefully with more news.  

IT!!!!

We have reached the half-way point in our little journey of deployment.  Actually more than half but I've been procrastinating writing this.  It's two weeks until Craig is home for mid-tour leave and I've become fixated one thing.  I feel like I'm being starved in a dungeon and my jailer reminds me that in two weeks I'm going to have a turkey dinner.  I'm going to wreck that turkey dinner.  Ian McEwan described it wonderfully in the book I just finished "Saturday";

"...thier movements are quick and greedy, urgent rather than joyous - it is as if they've returned from exile, emerged from a hard prison cell to gorge at a feast.  Their appetites are noisy, their manners are rough.  They can't quite trust their luck, they want all they can get in a short time.  They also know that at the end, after they've reclaimed each other, is the promise of oblivion."

Have you guessed what this blog post is about?

If you haven't guessed, be warned, this one is about sex.  Nothing graphic, this isn't a porn blog.  But if you're yucked out by the idea of me having a sex-life, I'm talking to you Mom, you might want to sit this one out.

I miss sex.  This should not come as a news-flash to anyone.  If the person you love is on the other side of the planet one thing that you'll notice, even if you notice nothing else, is the loss of physical companionship.  As it gets closer and closer to him being hear, little by little I'm able to allow myself to think about it.  I think if I thought about it as much as I wanted to I would have driven myself to total insanity apx 4 months ago.  Don't get me wrong.  I've gone long periods of time with out it, don't ask how long.  I just feel like this is more painful.  Having someone you love that loves you and not being able to share that can be torture.  I want to make one thing clear.  I'm not talking about intercourse.  Well, I am, but not exclusively.  I said I missed sex to one of my female friends and the response I got  was; "You should get a Vibrator." (when I said it to two male friends, one gay, one straight I got respectively; "Then have sex." and "Well I can help you out."  The latter comes from the hetero.  He was joking and yet, still creepy.)  None of these suggestions are useful for the following reasons.  First, I'm an adult woman, I already own a vibrator.  And, if for some reason I didn't, upon learning that my lover would be 7,500 miles away for a year it would have been one of my first purchases.  Second, I'm relatively cute and been known to be charming.  So, if I were so inclined, I could bone any night of the week.  That's not what I miss and not what I mean.

When I say sex I don't mean just the act.  I mean the whole thing.  The way he looks at me when we're sitting next to each other.  I can see out of my peripheral vision him looking at my neck.  Him holding my hand in a movie theater and putting it in his lap.  Not vulgar, just comfortably intimate.  That look he gives me when he wants to go home.  The "Let's blow this pop-stand" look.  The routine of getting ready for bed.  The total lack of self-consciousness.  The pretense at going to sleep before he rolls over to snuggle and smell my hair beginning an almost effortless, lazy, affectionate seduction.  Or, if the mood strikes, we jump urgently toward it.  The knowing that we are both free to give and take as we like.  To be selfish or generous and know that it can switch without discussion.  Embracing awkward moments that don't quite work and melting into ones that do.  Knowing I can go right to sleep after if I want to or that we could stay up all night just to do it all over again in the morning.  I miss knowing someone like that.  I miss him.  I miss his energy, his spirit, his breath, his warmth.

Gwad, I do sound antsy.  The frustration is driving me banana-pancakes.  I miss him--I guess this is just another part of that.  Thanks for listening.

This Week in Emailing (10/03/10-10/09/10)

I know it's a bit premature but this goes along with the birthday post and I thought it was pretty great!


"now on to more important things...i TOLD YOU they would make fun of me cuz of that sweater... i was dubbed 'the gay racecar driver'.  i still like the way it smells. and it is well done. just not my style...especially in a war zone. doesnt make me love it any less though. thanx again for the best bday present ive gotten in quite a few years."

This email is funny to me because it makes him sound 11 years old.  It also doesn't help that he still doesn't capitalize anything.  When we talked on the phone he mentioned shaving his head but didn't say anything about his pinkies being blown off so I'm going to assume that the shift key is broken on his computer and using caps-lock is too difficult.

PS What his unit doesn't know is that he is a gay race-car driver.
PPS  I think we've hit upon his new nickname.

Happy Birthday Craigory!!!

What day is today?  It's the Sgt's birthday.  What a day for a birthday.  Let's all have some cake.

Good news all around.  Woke-up this morning to a phone call from the great man himself.  Almost no one calls me in the morning and I didn't recognize the number so I didn't answer it.  He left a message and called again.  I looked at the number and thought; "If they're calling twice it could be important."  When I answered the phone I didn't recognize his voice.  In my defense I hadn't heard his rumbling growl in two and half months.  Here is a transcript of that first exchange as best as I can remember it.  Keep in mind that I was just waking up.

Me: Hello?
Craig: Hey.
Me: Hi? (still trying to figure out who it is.)
Craig: What time is it there?  Shouldn't you be up by now?
Me: (sudden realization) Oh my God!  Hey, baby!!

For the first few minutes I let him do all of the talking.  I have to admit, I was a bit gitty listening to him. The last time we spoke was the weekend of my brother's wedding at the end of July.  It's a funny thing.  I feel like I hear from him pretty often but under any other circumstances not hearing someone's voice for two months would be considered ridiculous.  I guess everything is relative.  One thing I noticed was the conversation got a bit choppy.  We email quite a bit (at his FOB there's no IM or Skype because they take up too much band-width and slow the internet down too much) and I think our brains are used to that sort of communication.  It's weird to have questions answered right after they're asked.  It made me nervous.  Plus, I think I've forgotten how to read his inflection.  He's in such a different place right now.  He sounds angry and tried and in real-life that would be a cause for concern but in his "other" life I think that's probably just normal.

"Angry" is the new "Normal"

We talked about his leave coming up and what he wants to do with his time.  We talked about how we're both excited and nervous.  He told me he looks different now.  I realized I haven't seen a picture of him in six months.  He shaved his head, is apparently ripped (all they do is work and workout) and he has no idea if he's lost weight or gained it.  He says that he drinks so much water right now that he has no idea what will happen when he's state-side and doesn't need to.  It's gonna be a wild ride seeing how this leave goes. 

On a happy note.  Let's have a big hip-hip for the US postal service.  I was so nervous it wouldn't get there but his birthday package arrived right on time.  He liked all the things I got for him.  He was nervous that I got him DVDs that he already owned but I won the day on that score.  Not only did he not have them, they are perfect for him.  Hooray for me!!!  He didn't, however, like the sweat shirt that I made for him.  It was actually a sweat shirt he gave to me before he left.  I sewed some cool stripes across the front.  I thought that I improved it but I guess it's not quite his style (plus civvies are not strictly allowed).  Oh well, not everyone can be as rad as me.

Here is Craig's birthday package.  I think the sweat shirt looks awesome.

We talked for about an hour before he had to get off the phone.  There's always a line of guys waiting.  I always feel a vague depression when we get off the phone.  I never know when I'm going to hear from him again and that leaves me pretty sad sometimes.  It's always a double-edged sword.

Well that was Craig's birthday.  See you next time.

It's OCTOBER!!!!!

I'm just so excited!!!  Craig is going to be here in 20 days and I'm totally crazy about it.

The closer it gets to him being here the more scared I get.  I'm already putting a lot of presser on myself to make everything perfect and I know things are just not going to go according to plan and I'm going to feel like it's all my fault.  I know it's totally silly.  I just need to enjoy myself.  Part of me feels like if I just get all these fears and feelings out now that when he is here I can just be in the moment and I will have let go of all this stuff.  Here's hoping anyway.