The toughest thing about deployment...
Everytime I find myself starting a sentence like that, I realize the toughest thing about the deployment is...the deployment.
With apologies to Rent, how do you measure a deployment?
Five hundred twenty-five thousand moments of estrangement.
Five hundred twenty-five thousand six hundred minutes
How do you measure, measure a deployment?
In packages, in "free mail," in garbage nights?
In calls at 3 am?
In miles, in timezones, in laughter, in tears?
Or how about in date nights, birthdays, anniversaries, holidays missed?
Or in the birth of our first child? Her first smile? In her inches and her pounds?
What is getting me sad lately is that I find myself wishing the time away. I want to fast forward to when my husband is back home--and to when Lilah has her surgery and recovers and is a healthy baby.
I haven't put my life on hold. I've gone out with friends...to concerts, to crafts fairs, to meetings and to parties.
I've volunteered. I've worked. I've had visitors. I've read. Heck, I've even gone to Italy...5 months pregnant, no less.
Right now, though, I feel done. I don't want to be strong. I don't want to "drive on."
I want him home, safe and sound. I want our little family to be whole.
I know I shouldn't wish months of my life away, though. So I look at Lilah and she snaps me back into the moment.
This isn't really a "helpful information" post (there will be more of those later) so much as a "sharing" and "support" post.
Who else out there is dealing with a deployment? How far in? How far to go? How are you coping today (because we all know, "Tomorrow is another day")? What do you do to keep yourself focused on the here and now?
Someone sent me a Deployment Countdown, which I should not have opened since you never really know how long it is going to be. According to the clock (not according to any information I have about his actual return) we have:
Ninety-five thousand, seven hundred and thirteen minutes to go.
Measure in Love...
