Military Life

Over the past few days I have been helping our good friends Andrew and Lauren get ready to move back to the States from Okinawa. The military has a pretty extensive check out process before a move, and one of the first steps along the way is de-registering your car. Of course, with typical military planning, all subsequent steps require car transportation between remote offices. This meant I was a taxi all week. During the car rides they asked some good questions that I've been thinking about all week.


The first question was "Did you know what you were getting into when you married the military?" The answer is both yes and no. My military stereotype involved lots of moving and a frequently absent husband. Did I expect Peter to get deployed? Yes. Did I expect him to be gone for over a year, while I was left alone in a foreign country? No. Did I know I would have to move a lot? Yes. Did I know I'd have to give up my job when I moved, and that it would be hard to find a new job? No. Did I know I'd have to make new friends roughly every six months because everyone else in the military moves frequently too? No. In my mind, everyone else was going to stay the same while we moved around.

The frequent farewells are one of the hardest things for me to deal with in the military. I've only been doing this for two years, and I already feel like I spend a significant portion of my time managing my e-social life with all my absent friends. The rest of my social energy is spent making new friends. I have very few good friendships where I'm currently living. As soon as they reach "good friend" status they move.

Another thing that I didn't realize about being a military wife was that in addition to having to sacrifice my home and my job and my friends, I would also have to sacrifice my identity. In all things military, I am a "dependent." At the doctor's office, I am identified by my husband's social security number, not my own. His rank determines what clubs I can enter and what friends I can have. I use an ID card with HIS name and rank when I go grocery shopping. His name is on our cars and bank accounts. I am just a tag along. This was really hard for me to deal with, so I went out and got a government job that issued me my own ID card with MY social security number on it and my own rank: contractor. But it took significant effort on my part to be someone other than Peter's shadow.

The next question was "How did Peter ask that sacrifice of you?" The answer to that one is simple: he didn't. Just like Peter volunteered for the Navy, I volunteered to be a Navy spouse. I'm proud to be his wife. I'm proud to support him. Even when he's deployed and I'm stranded on an island using his social security number to schedule my medical care, I don't regret it. I never have. I LOVE him, and if I have to marry the Navy in order to be married to him, then so be it.


The last question was "Are you counting down until you see Peter again?" The answer to that one is also no. I'll see him in roughly a month, and then he's gone for a LONG time. Instead of counting down the days, hours, and minutes of this deployment, I think it's easier to count up. It boosts my morale to think of how many days I've conquered without him rather than to think of how many I have left to get through. I do count down to mini-goals, like when I'll hear from him again (hopefully by Friday, and if I'm lucky I'll have an email from him tomorrow), or how long until the SPED teacher gets here so I can teach normal-intelligence, mentally stable children again (hopefully four days). I try to find weekly things to look forward to, because I still have 10 months to go, and that's a long time to wait. But I've made it through nearly 100 days already.

I Love you Peter!

Roommates

We've all had to live with roommates. Some at college, some while we pretended to go to college, etc. We all know the sacrifices you have to make with a roommate. Shoved into an 8 x 12 foot room and sharing a bathroom, only a small space to keep ALL of your stuff. You're forced to keep everything shoved into that small space otherwise you'd never be able to walk down the two foot gap between your beds or find your bed.

There are of course certain things that you must do to keep the peace while living with a roommate. Keeping your things cleaned up, keeping the music down, not turning on the lights when you come in at four in the morning. You know, common sense things. I abide by these unspoken laws (right now, my room is actually pretty messy on account of me). However, I have not experienced any of the common courtesies displayed towards me. As I write this my eardrums are being blasted by about 100 decibels of horrible R&B music. The mess in our room? Half my fault right now and the other half is his. Usually, it's all his fault. The bathroom? Only gets cleaned by myself so, it hasn't in the last month (okay we weren't here but that's besides the point). My roommate came back here to the room several times while we were out for training and I know for a fact that he didn't clean anything because it was indeed messier than what I left it.

Sorry, this was a rant because I'm fed up. Some people are just so ignorant.

A hard act to follow

Wow, those are hard blogs to follow. Especially given what I did the last month... nothing. I guess I should start by congratulating my wife on her hard work and the spirit and drive that she's shown in the face of adversity (namely me being gone and her having to carry the groceries up the stairs). I can not express how proud I am of her that her teaching career is skyrocketing, she's making new friends (even ones who don't speak the same language as her) and she is starting ANOTHER career in writing/photojournalism. She is the shining star of the military wife and I feel she deserves some public recognition. I Love her so much.
Now for my exciting month. I can pretty much sum it up like this. We sat, sweat, ran, sweat, sweat, sweat, sat in humvess, sweat, sat some more, the AC in our tent broke (again and again), slept a little, sweat and sat. That was pretty much my month of August. Interrupted by a mortar shoot about halfway through and various vehicle chases at Ft. Irwin. My platoon also managed to get three role players fired and get three E-4/5s busted all the way down to E-1. It was a busy month of sitting. Of course the hardest thing about all of it was the lack of communication with my wife (who handled it quite gracefully I might add).


This is the military life. Welcome to it.




ILY OXXX

WAHOOO!!!

Check out Page 5 of this week's edition of Stripes Okinawa, where I had an article AND a photograph published.

My Fantastic Article

It was a total ego boost, which will probably make me unlivable for a while because I'm pretty much my own biggest fan when it comes to my creative pursuits. This is the first time I have gotten paid for doing something creative, and it's the first time I've ever had any professional acknowledgment of a photograph.

AND to top my day off, I heard from Peter today for the first time in several weeks. He is doing well, and I'm sure he'll be posting a blog soon.

More dancers, because Obon was this week and I haven't gotten over the Eisa dancing yet.

More Eisa Photos!

I don't have much news this week because I have been working like a maniac. I was put in as the moderate/severe special ed teacher at the middle school, which will be full time until the new teacher moves to the island. Then I'm teaching two college classes in the evening and tutoring as well. So unless you want to hear about math, there isn't much to say! But here are the rest of the promised Eisa photos:

This is me with a clown and a drummer after my dance lesson.

This is a drummer.

These guys were clowns. Or at least, they looked like clowns to me.

A Tripod Makes the Difference

On Saturday night I was all settled in for an evening in front of the television when I heard noise outside. I went out on the balcony to investigate and there were about 100 Eisa dancers parading down my street. Eisa dancers are traditional Japanese folk dancers that perform to drum and shamisen music. I ran back inside, grabbed the camera equipment, and followed them down the street.

They stopped at a small park. There seemed to be a festival happening. There were tables set up, food, drinks, paper lanterns, and the dancers were performing. I was lurking on the outskirts of the park, trying to find a good location to take some photos without disturbing the celebration, when a lady in a kimono came over and invited me to come join the party and take photos. I think the large camera bag and tripod might have given my intentions away.

Not only was I the only American at the party, I also was the only person not formally dressed. Most of the ladies were wearing kimonos. I was wearing a pajama top and jean shorts. I tried to keep to the fringes and take my photos without intruding any more than I already was. The dancing lasted for about 15 minutes. When the dancers left, I followed them to see if I could get some to pose for photos. They started eating dinner, and I didn't want to interrupt their meal, so I waited outside the park again.

Kimono Lady

Kimono Lady saw me again and literally dragged me across the park to seat me front and center at the guest of honor table. They brought me food and tea, and found someone who could speak English to translate for me. They told me the names of each type of food on my plate. They offered me lessons in how to use chopsticks.

Male Dancers

They explained that the party was a function for the employees from the hospital down the street from me. They told me the names of the dances. I asked if I could take photos of the dancers. They thought I wanted to learn to dance. They brought me out on the dance floor and gave me dance lessons. It was SO FUN!!

Female Dancers

After the dance lesson, the party broke up. I asked my translator if he could ask the dancers to pose for me, and he found someone in each costume. They introduced lots of people to me, and when they found out that I am a teacher they all wanted English lessons. They said they will drop by for tea after work, and that they are honored to have an American friend. I was honored to be allowed to join their party. It was one of the most amazing cultural experiences I have ever had.

Note: There are more pictures but Blogger is not allowing me to upload them...I'll add them later when it cooperates again.

Sand, Sun and no sleep

Many of you here in the states have had frequent contact with me since I have been stationed here at Camp Pendleton. I have had a cell phone which I use frequently and internet access which I use even more. So, talking to Peter has not been hard.

However, all good things come to an end and the last ten days Peter has been "indisposed". I had my cell phone with me mind you but, it didn't work out in the middle of bum fuck nowhere (please excuse the language, I've been hanging out with Marines and it's kind of gone downhill). I have spent the last ten days "training" which really just means going with out sleep, food and water for extended periods of time while running and firing a weapon. It was fun and also made me realize that I REALLY don't like guns but, that's a different subject. Let me tell you about my week shall I?

Day one: wake up before the sun. Bring gear to staging area. Bring gear to different staging area and load on trucks. Wait three hours. Load on bus. Drive north three to three and half hours with crazy lady bus driver. Get lost on Fort Irwin. Drive to same spot three times and finally on third time realize it is correct spot. Offload bus. Move from hot ass sun into hot ass tent with Battalion (a Battalion is roughly 500-600 guys). Procede to sweat off balls in hot ass tent from 1300 to 1700. Load on 7-ton truck and await movement to real camp. Midnight- get woken up to be told we are spending the night in hot ass tent.

Day two: wake up with sun. Load on 7-ton. Drive on dusty road for about an hour to Forward Operating Base (FOB). Horray FOB tents have A/C (will cover this more later). Unload gear, set up sleeping area.

Day two night: 2100, all others are going to bed. My platoon (whiskey 3 or simply W3) gets called on to go retrieve some vehicles that have broken down. 2330, find vehicles as they are towing each other up dusty road. Drive ten miles an hour back to FOB. 0130 Get back to FOB. Sleep. 0330 (or about there I'm not really sure) wake up shivering due to A/C in tent being EXTREMELY cold.

Day three: wake up with sun. Eat. Hydrate. Attend BS class on something stupid (I honestly don't remember what they tried to teach us). Sleep. 0330 (or somewhere) wake up shivering again despite sleeping in fleece, pants and socks.

Day four: wake up and load humvees for overnight training, and I quote "we're only going to be out one night". Pack two pairs of socks and two shirts just in case. Around 1500 get told that we're not going back to the FOB and will be out on the range for the remainder of the week. Training site has no AC tents I might add.

Day Five: Shoot machine gun. Don't remember much else from that day.

Pretty much Days four through eight are the same. Wake up before the sun. Eat. Train. Get stopped in middle of training due to "black flag" conditions meaning it's too hot to train. It got to be thirty degrees hotter where we were than downtown Baghdad. During black flag we move to the shade usually, underneath a humvee. Yes, UNDERNEATH the humvee. We also take off our flak jackets and kevlar which are our protective elements that weigh a lot and keep body heat in. Enjoy coolness of not having flak and kevlar on. Get told to put flak and kevlar back on due to "hellfire" status. Meaning helicopter pilots are such bad shots that even though we're miles away they might still hit us. So there were are in heat deemed to hot to train or wear flak and kevlar... with our flak and kevlar on because some stupid Army pilot might miss his target. Army, they'll take anybody.,

As if this isn't enough to make you mad. We were waking up before the sun and training until mid afternoon. Then stopping due to the heat. Then we would train some more in the evening. Then we would sleep until about midnight and wake up to train at night. The back to sleep around two or maybe three. Then wake up before the sun again. So there we are. Weapons Company, tired, hungry, stinky, all of us have athletes foot (most people brought one pair of socks for the "one night" training that turned into five or six days, hotter than Baghdad and pissed off because we're sitting around not training. God I love the military sometimes.