Once in August, we said, “I do.”

Weddings and marriages are funny. How often do you see a celebrity lavishly pour out a million dollars on a wedding, and everyone is oohing and aaahing over it, KNOWING that marriage probably won’t even last.

Our wedding was beautiful.

Well, I thought so anyway. It was no celebrity affair, but it fit me, with a touch of Alan. Everything was simple and pretty and stuffed to the brim with guests.

Before Alan proposed, I had never stopped to think about what kind of wedding I wanted– not for two seconds. I never dreamed about my wedding. It just wasn’t something I ever thought about. I DID think about the groom, that part I was day dreaming about practically from birth. “Who will I marry?” must have been one of my earliest questions.

I even dreamed about my dream house, drawing out house plan after house plan. My plans were never for one or two or even four people, either. They always included rooms for extended family, like in Full House. I always wanted a house chock full of people, which is exactly what I have.

Alan proposed to me at Callaway Gardens over spring break his senior year and my junior year of college.

We mooned over our new engagement all the way home. This was before social media was invented. We emailed all of our friends to let them know the news that week from Alan’s parents’ living room desktop computer.

The minute we got back, Nonna (Alan’s mom) was excited to start talking about wedding plans. Uhhhh…ummmm… My family had never even discussed weddings or anything of the sort because I had never brought it up. I did not know anything about weddings. The only weddings I could even remember were ones I attended as a child.

I was the flower girl in one, and I was Amber’s maid of honor just the year before. Those were two very different weddings. One was a big church wedding, and that is all I remember about it. I was eight. Then Amber’s wedding was a small one of family and closest friends.

But I was very new to Alan’s family, and I was not about to admit that I was completely ignorant of the world of tulle and centerpieces. I did my best to nod along. Sure, who cares, whatever, I am getting married to Alan! So happy!!!

Suddenly, there I was with stacks of Bride magazines and a book on wedding etiquette, on loan from Nonna’s personal library.

It was fun and exciting, but I was like a deer in the headlights. “I don’t think my parents can afford a big wedding. Maybe we can get friends to do some of these things, and just have the wedding and reception at my church. I really have no idea how my parents will want to do all of this.”

My parents were not taken by surprise by the proposal. Alan asked Dad before he asked me. They set me a reasonable budget to stick to for the wedding, and we did our best. Looking back, I think the wedding turned out beautifully. I admittedly should have thought through the reception better. The room was a little small for 150 guests, but it was never meant to be a sit-down dinner. This was a casual reception in the fellowship hall of the church, and that was how I wanted it to be. Fussy and frilly and going all out was not my thing back then, nor did I have the money for that.

After our wedding, it seemed like the flood gates opened, and suddenly we were constantly going to weddings.

At the time I remember thinking, “If only these could have happened before mine! I could have copied so many ideas…”

But you know what? It is best that it did not happen that way. The way things actually happen is usually what is best. Our wedding was a reflection of just us, Alan and me. Well, truly, it was a reflection of me and my mom and Alan and his mom because when you get married at twenty-one and twenty-three, the mothers are heavily involved. It is a good thing too. Without our mothers’ input, you all could have been eating Guthries chicken fingers and drinking soda. Ha!!

One of my funniest memories is trimming Nonna’s guest list with Alan. We had to take a list of about three hundred down to one hundred for him and one hundred for me, or something like that, and that was pretty hilarious. It was reminiscent of that Father of the Bride movie. Alan was such a great sport about it all too. He knew I had my heart set on getting married in the church I grew up in, and he just trimmed away.

Before I knew I would be getting married that summer, I also had lined up a summer job as a camp counselor in Texas for myself, at a place called Pine Cove, or something like that. In May, I mentioned the camp to my mom, and she said I absolutely could not run off to camp and leave her to plan that whole wedding by herself, and I was like, “Ohhh… right. Okay, yes, that is fair.”

Ha! Mom had her hands full with me. I was so young and clueless, but it was never about the actual wedding day for me.

It was about the actual marriage. Alan and I agreed that when we said “forever” we meant “forever”. There was no pre-nup. We could not wait to start our life story together.

Someone once asked Ruth Graham if she ever considered divorcing Reverend Billy Graham, with how often he was gone. She had the best answer: “Divorce? No. Never. Murder, yes.”

I thought that was a squarely perfect and honest answer. Everyone wants to be that sweet old couple, but you have to cross through all the years of immaturity, growing, battles, and facing life together to get to those golden years.

We are in this for more than a beautiful wedding day. Our finish line is still too far away to even see. Even still, I enjoy day dreaming about it.

I may have day dreamed out loud one too many times because the boys are starting to ask, “When are we moving to Mom’s farm in Alabama??”

Oops…It is not a farm exactly I want, it is the peace and landscape, and yes, Alabama. Most importantly, stability is what I long for. My someday house does not pick up and move every two years to the next undisclosed location. It sits peacefully, at one with its surroundings. The people in this house always know who to list as their emergency contacts.

There is room for Alan to teach the boys to shoot and maybe even fish. It has ample outdoor space and a district zone for a few chickens and a small kitchen garden. In my imagination, I can magically not kill the plants, you see.

The church is not far away, and I can drive to my parents’ house in much less than a day. There is a school for each boy there that is just perfect for them. It is hot down there, but that is okay because we have one of those quick set pools. Alan won’t fuss about the pool killing the grass either because we are not going to need to sell the house in two years. We are there to stay for as long as we or the good Lord sees fit.

‘Til death do us part. I could not have done this adventure with anyone else.

The fun of it all was a big deal to me then, and it still is. At twenty-one, I did not want to buy my rural house in Alabama yet and settle down. What I wanted was to run away with this guy, and we did just that.

We honeymooned in Jamaica, and then I rode with him to his officer training in Oklahoma. Everything we saw was new and fun, from climbing Dunn’s River Falls to New York City. It has been one expedition after another, and I loved it.

I know I mentioned in my last post how many of the hardships really caught up with me this year. That is true. Alan went to Iraq for twelve months early on, then fifteen months a few years later, and then Afghanistan in 2011. We have moved far more than is sane, but with any journey, there are obstacles.

Life is a battle, but ours has been a thrilling one. It is true that I am so ready to be done with the moving, but I would not trade our road for any other. I love what God has blessed us with and what we have built together. It is such an honor and a joy to be a part of it.

Here’s to decades and decades more. I love you. We are greatly blessed.

“Every good thing given and every perfect gift is from above, coming down from the Father of lights, with whom there is no variation or shifting shadow.”

James 1:17

I’m linking up with Finding Ninee today for Finish the Sentence Friday here. This week’s prompt is “Once in August”.

The post Once in August We Said “I Do” appeared first on Stories of Our Boys.

****This post is part of my series on Real Army Wives. This series follows my husband’s first deployment to Iraq in 2003, but it’s the story of the wives back home more so than the men at war. Click here for last week’s post, Alan’s Convoy Attack.*****

Mon., October 6, 2003

Alan,

I’ve had a week off now to think about what it is I should be doing. I really still want to be a physical therapist. The only reason I ever dropped it was because of all the science classes. So today I searched every college in a one hour radius of here, and there are NO physical therapy schools, not even any physical therapy assistant schools.

So that door is just closed to me. Now I simply don’t know what to do. And I’m unsure if I should look for part-time or full-time work. Plus, I’ve already planned long vacations for Thanksgiving and Christmas and payed for the plane tickets.

I don’t know what to do. What do you think? I’d really love to hear your thoughts. I love you, Alan.

I was talking to Elsie today too, and she said that the Army will pay for you to get a master’s degree. You just have to commit to more time in the Army. I want you to know that at this point I would be fine with that.

You are excellent at what you’re doing, and I know it makes you happy. And now I KNOW what it is like to have a job that you hate, so I think once you find something you enjoy, you should stick with that. I will always support you.

[clickToTweet tweet=”I know what it is to have a job that you hate. Once you find a job you enjoy, you should stick with that. #milspouse” quote=”‘I know what it is to have a job that you hate, so I think once you find something you enjoy, you should stick with that. I will always support you.'”]

It’s hard with writing. Sometimes you may read things one way, but really I was saying it another. There’s no sure-fire tone of voice in writing. So let me just say this: This letter is written in a completely, gentle, thoughtful, tired kind of voice. I am a person who at this moment is just wondering what direction to go in.

It must be awesome to know what you want to do and be doing it. I wish I were as lucky as you. Oh, now I’m making myself cry…

Sarah’s husband Zack is landing in Killeen TONIGHT, in the next few hours. She’s all excited and anxious, of course. She wanted Cloe and me to go with her, but when she found out he’s getting in so late, she told us not to worry about it.

Sarah’s husband was finished with his service obligation and was on his way home. How we would miss her!

I guess my world is about to REALLY change. I’m going to miss Sarah. They’re moving in December too. I guess it’s like when Reston (Lt. Arizona) left you. Reston’s wife is supposed to find out today if they’re sending him home or not. I wonder if she found out, and if he’s coming home or not.

I broke the computer desk Saturday. I was having trouble buying a flight ticket, and I was feeling all rushed because I was supposed to be at Elsie’s to go to the hockey game. Everyone was waiting for me, but the American Airlines site kept messing up, so I was angry, and I slammed my fist down on the desk, and the shelf below just popped right out…..Sorry.

I miss you: firm, steady, calm, responsible, you. I need you.

I hate being a lazy bum like this. I hate how everybody asks me what I’m going to do.

I hate that you’re allergic to cats, and that I will have to give up Kitty.

Everything just isn’t what it I thought it should be.

And I’m going to have to wait 6 more months to see you again. How I wish you could just be here tonight. I wish you could be on that plane with Zack.

In a perfect world, huh? But of course, this is not a perfect world.

But Lord willing, one day you will be back. One day I will wake up before lunch time. One day I’ll be doing something I enjoy. One day.

I love you, Alan. You’re my husband. Talking to you is the highlight of my week.

I love you,

April

****************

Melancholy

Melancholy is not my typical state at all, but I do suppose that’s where I was when I wrote that letter.

Finding yourself at a fork in the road when you have no idea which way to go is not my favorite. It can be an exciting phase when you stop to consider the seemingly endless possibilities, but it didn’t feel that way to me.

I felt lost in the desert all over again, stuck in the middle of Texas with no plan whatsoever.

Doors all around me were closed, but I can tell you I am not one to sit around in the waiting place, content to just be. No, that isn’t me at all.

Restlessness is a feeling I cannot tolerate. That’s how I began my traveling phase.

This was 2003, well before the days of iPhones, but we did have Google Maps on our personal computers. I charted myself a course, mostly on I-10, got myself a good night’s sleep and set off for Alabama in my royal blue Pontiac Grand Am.

My parents would be so surprised when I showed up at their door unannounced!

I did call my brother, a college student at Troy at the time who lived at home with my parents, just so someone in the world knew where I was, but I swore him to secrecy.

I pulled into my parents’ driveway around 2am. I’d called Mom a couple hours prior to arriving to insure safe entry. Ha! But Dad didn’t know I was there until he got up in the morning. That was such a fun surprise!

There in Alabama, I enjoyed just being with my family. I slept in my little twin bed, in the bedroom I’d shared with my sister for most of my life. The familiar old surroundings of home and family were healthy for me. It was a good time to put my recent failure behind me and come up with a new plan for the future.

I actually spent most of the rest of 2003 on the road. Instead of staying with family through the holidays, I drove back to Texas a week later. Then I took a trip to Houston to Cloe’s parents’ house, along with Elsie, Kayla, and Cloe. After that, there was a trip to Florida with Jennings. I had Thanksgiving with my family and Christmas with both families, and I’ll have to save more about all those trips for another chapter.

I think where we run to in times of trouble or uncertainty says a lot about us.

For me, I guess I was running home to my mom. Ha! But sometimes that is absolutely the BEST course of action, isn’t it? I hope my children will know they can run to my house as a refuge too.

And you’ll be happy to know that I actually did come up with a plan, quite of my own accord. I decided to take the GRE and go back to school, to a local satellite branch of Tarleton State University. I enrolled in the graduate school to pursue a counseling certificate.

Did I want to be a counselor?

Eh…not really, and certainly not right away, but I was considering it. I felt deeply that I was too young to be counseling people. But I WAS excited about going back to school and getting back into the psychology field. My bachelor’s degree was in psychology, and I figured I could figure out my path as I went along.

Sometimes you have to jump right in and try it to figure out if a thing is for you or not!

Life as a military spouse is just like that. There weren’t many online graduate programs that I knew of, so I was doing the best I could with what I could find.

“When we are so wedded to what we think should be happening or what we want to happen, we don’t see what IS happening.”

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I love Christmas break. Time off from spelling tests, chauffeur duties, graded papers, packing lunches, and best of all I’m not desperately rushing everyone to not be late…..oh how I love time off.

We always spend a few days at my parent’s house and a few days at Alan’s parents’ house, and it’s such a blessing to spend time with them and soak up the rest and good conversation.

With people you see on a daily basis, it can be easy to fall prey to simply talking about your shared problems and the annoying people you have to deal with. Ha! We all have them.

But when we get together with family at Christmas, we can re-focus on what matters and gain wisdom from others. We can always do that during the everyday too, of course, but I get the best ideas when I have some time and space to read and think!

Daniel and his favorite cousin at Christmas. They were born only a month apart.

I am reading 2 books and taking 1 online course that I’m gaining immensely from. One is on grocery budgeting and the other is on marriage. The course is about planning.

Alan even found an app for us to use for grocery shopping that has also been hugely helpful. I wanted to pass those along to y’all.

The Books

1.) How to Win the Grocery Game

I’m including an eBay link above for that one, which I do not make any money from. I just found the eBay price to be slightly better than Amazon.

This is an extremely practical book about saving money on grocery shopping. However, it was written in the 1970s and is extremely outdated. I’ve had to look for more modern ways to implement some of the strategies in this book, but it’s the strategies and the meal planning tips that make the book worth while…..if you can look past the insane price amounts on everything. You have to ignore those since this book is from the 70s!!

I’ll share with you a modern app I’ve used to help me do one thing from the book later in this post.

2.) Created to Be His Helpmeet

The above link is to the Amazon Kindle edition, but it is available in paperback on Amazon and other sellers as well. I do earn a small percentage when you buy through this link.

This book doesn’t even attempt political correctness with words like “hillbilly ugly” and “submit”. Ha! You have been warned.

But I’ve found it to be practical and helpful, a solid reminder. It has also helped me understand my husband better, as she divides men up into three groups: command types, visionaries, and steady men.

The book is about becoming a kinder, more helpful wife, and by doing that, you can’t help but improve your marriage, even if you’re married to the Grinch himself. I’m only 1/3 the way through it, but so far it has helped me to straight up be a nicer person at home with my husband.

I also love that it’s written by an older woman. She has walked through all the phases of life, and she’s sharing what she has learned.

Us with Alan’s side of the fam. Greg was MIA this year due to food poisoning. You were missed, Greg!

The App

As I mentioned above, I’ve found a more modern way to implement the grocery strategy, but it isn’t foolproof. I’m not sure if the database is leaving out all the goods from stores like Aldi and the Pig because they came up less frequently than I expected. Some work may still need to be done there.

But if you want an easy way to compare everyday prices at one store with sale prices from the circulars, this is an awesome app.

It’s called Basket.

You type in your grocery list. It gives you options for brands and lines them up by price. Try it out. You may end up spending hours on it like Alan and I have.

We put in our entire grocery list, and then we hit “compare prices”. It showed us that the cheapest way to get all our groceries at one store was to go to Walmart. However, the real issue was that Walmart was the only store that carried every item on our list.

To get the best savings, you can tell it to break it up into 2 stores. That gave us Walmart and Food Depot. In the list, it breaks down which items we should buy at Food Depot and which ones we should purchase at Walmart.

Wow, huh?

It was funny how it would switch stores as we put more groceries in!

However, Alan found that not all of the prices and sizes were available at Walmart, so checking your weekly circulars is still important.

I think this is a good tool, but it doesn’t truly replace searching through the weekly grocery ads.

Christmas morning

Chore Looping

Another exciting tip I got this Christmas is “chore looping,” which my sister-in-law, Amy, told me about.

For those of us who have trouble with other methods of keeping up with house cleaning schedules, chore looping is the way to go.

You make a list of tasks, like this:

• Scrub hall bathroom.
• Clean the kitchen.
• Sweep and mop the floors.
• Scrub master bath.

etc., etc. Add whatever rooms you have.

Then you work through it until you reach the end and start over, and it doesn’t have to be all in one day, all in one week, or even all in one month. You just work through the list as you are able.

Some tasks you have to write on your list more than once, like scrubbing that bathroom that all 4 boys use…bleh…

For Example:

• Scrub hall bathroom.
• Clean the kitchen.
• Sweep and mop the floors.
• Scrub master bath.
• Vacuum.
• Scrub hall bathroom.
• Tidy up dining room.
• Clean the kitchen.
• Tidy up living room.
• Dust the house.
• Scrub hall bathroom….lol…again and again and again…

…And the list goes on until you’ve covered all the tasks you can think of.

Some days you do 3 or 4 of them. Other days you do 1 or none at all. It just depends on when you have the time!

If you do marathon clean, then you skip the repeats. I almost never marathon clean. Why? Because it’s exhausting, and I was always hoping I’d be affording a maid by now….lol

Daniel helping with the Men’s Pancake Breakfast at church

I’ll save my excitement of my new Brilliant Life Planner and accompanying online planning course for another day. I can’t wait to show it to you. In fact, I’m definitely going to do a Facebook Live all about this planner this week, on my Stories of Our Boys Facebook page.

I hope you all had an absolutely fabulous Christmas and are as excited about the new year as I am! Actually, I’m pretty nervous about 2018. Moving…deep breaths…deep breaths…I’m going to need all the organization I can accomplish!

“For I know the plans I have for you,” declares the LORD, “plans to prosper you and not to harm you, plans to give you hope and a future.”    Jeremiah 29:11

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The post My 4 Favorite Homemaking Hacks for 2018 appeared first on Stories of Our Boys.

****This post is part of the series Real Army Wives on storiesofourboys.com. This series chronicles the story of our first deployment, back in 2003.****

Once Alan had been gone for 6 months, and we were finally able to communicate regularly, we found that we began to bicker–even from continents away. We were having newlywed problems, whether we were together or not.

Alan was anxious to move us forward towards our goals in the U.S., yet he was stuck in a combat zone, feeling powerless to affect change. He wanted me to go out and buy a $70,000 house. Plus, he thought I should move us in there by myself so we could start building equity……I was like, “Heck no, I won’t go..”

I wanted him to call more. He gave me the actual reasons he couldn’t.

I was disappointed that he hadn’t had a family member send me an anniversary gift.

Granted, my expectations were HIGH, and he was never one to sugar-coat a single thing…..so we had issues….

an Iraqi flag Alan sent me in a package

On October, 1, 2003, I wrote him out this list, half-joking, half-serious, to lay out all of my expectations and avoid further arguments…

So here’s a guide for you– to save your marriage and prevent further fights.

{Alan may not have enjoyed reading this, but at least he knew how to not upset me going forward, which made for a better marriage relationship.}

Keep this in mind if your spouse deploys! It may help you! And you may even be able to say it with less sass than I did, and it would sound downright sweet…

#1. Call me every chance you get, BUT if you decide not to because….

a.) You think it’s not a good time.

b.) You don’t want to wait in line.

c.) You’re cheap.

OR

d.) You want to let other people call their families…

Fine, but you NEVER should tell me these excuses. Keep them to yourself. Don’t tell me you purposefully didn’t call! Especially for the above excuses which DO NOT help.

#2. Mid-Tour Leave– Yes, of course you want to take it.

ALL you care about is seeing your wife ASAP. You would do anything to get to see her. It doesn’t matter that you have to go back to Iraq. Even for a day with me, you’d do anything.

#3.) Pictures: Never return pictures I send to you.

How would you feel if you mailed me a picture of yourself that you thought was good-looking, and I just mailed it right back to you? HELLLOOOO!

#4.) Please record all tapes to me when your roommate is not in the room.

….This was very much a 2003 problem. We recorded each other cassette tapes. Nowadays this advice would apply more to phone calls.

For at least half of the tape, please be alone. Otherwise, you are way too official and business like, and there’s nothing mushy on the whole tape. Yuck. I hate getting business tapes about money, etc.  I just want you to be absorbed in me the person, not me the dependent.

#5.) All holiday and special occasions should be accompanied by a gift OR flowers.

Being apart does not take away your responsibility to make me feel special. For example, everyone else’s husbands arranged for them to get flowers on their anniversaries and/or birthdays. Don’t give me that crap about you can’t because you can.

Here’s how:

1- You arrange it when you have internet access.

2- Otherwise, you write a family member (i.e. parents) and ask them to send me something specific and reimburse them with a check. You have checks.

#6.) What qualifies as a holiday?

Anniversary, Birthday, Christmas, and Valentine’s Day

~~~~~~~~~~~

That’s all I can think of right now….I know you probably feel a little offended that I made you this list, but I’m just sparing us future fights by alerting you to my expectations of you as my husband.

I hope this doesn’t sound harsh. I’m not trying to sound harsh. I just don’t want to have to cry all the way to Sea World like I did the other weekend because there are some things you simply don’t understand.

Now I do realize that I’ve been guilty of the same thing, so see, I’m working on it.

My tapes have since been VERY sweet and the last one was even rated R. {Note to self, destroy all tapes.} Plus, I have increased your packages and refrained from reacting quickly to things that you say that I hope you don’t mean.

*********

No long deployment is going to happen without some disagreements. We all just have to do our best to be understanding and give each other the benefit of the doubt. Meanwhile, I think this list was a big help, especially since it was the FIRST year of our marriage!

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Our measly month together in Oklahoma was kind of a blur, but there were a few things that happened that I have not been able to live down.

Three incidents to be exact, okay maybe 4 or 5…geesh I was full of mishaps that first month, but there are three I’d like to share!

….We’ll just skip the story of our first huge fight when Alan was following me, and I missed the correct exit, my cell phone battery was dead, and Alan breezed right past on to the next exit. Let’s just say I threw the mother of all fits. Alan had quite a firecracker on his hands.

The first misadventure happened on our loooooooong car trip from Alabama to Oklahoma after Christmas.

Alan was driving his car, and I was driving mine. I left my car with my parents when I had flown out to Oklahoma to attend that military ball with Alan the day I graduated, so now we were taking it home with us.

We stayed up late each night in Alabama that Christmas, talking to family, and by the time we began our 15-or-so-hour-road trip, we were already tired.

By the time we reached Vicksburg, Mississippi, I didn’t know if I was going to make it 2 more seconds, much less 3 more states!!

Vicksburg, Mississippi, 2002

Alan was all kinds of jazzed up to see the Vicksburg battle grounds! His ancestor had fought there, probably more than one ancestor, and he’d learned about this battle in great detail. Alan couldn’t wait to see Vicksburg in person.

Well, y’all, this battle ground might have been a sight to see in 1864, or whenever, but it was nothing but a bunch of rolling green hills with historic markers in December, 2002.

“Is it okay if I just ride in the passenger seat of your car and sleep?” I asked.

Alan was probably shocked at my apathy, but I do recall parking my car, sliding in with Alan, and getting a good nap in Vicksburg.

I also remember that it wasn’t enough to recover, and we had to spend the night in Shreveport or some other Louisiana city that night because there was no way I was going to stay awake all the way across Texas.

This is humorous to me now because I would LOVE to see Vicksburg!! What has military life done to me???

Maybe it was my genealogical research that turned up my own Vicksburg veterans, or maybe it was the Lincoln book I read that taught me so much about the importance of that place, but 15 years later, I actually get why those rolling green fields were exciting!

Me in my kitchenette in our little Temporary Duty Apartment, which is like a nice extended stay hotel suite on military posts.

Unfortunate Incident #2: The Not-So-Fun Family Fun Run

So there was this “Family Fun Run” the last week of Alan’s Officer Basic Course training. It was a 1 mile formation jog. They invited the wives, not that many of the students were even married at that point. Supposedly, this was a fun, easy thing to do.

That morning I was surprised to see a Lieutenant in a Spongebob costume, and everyone seemed all giggly and happy, as they did push-ups on asphalt and all sorts of active, difficult things.

I felt like death frozen over. What was this fresh new form of torture?

I’d just finished 21 hours of senior level courses at Alabama to come here, only to be forced out of my bed in the dark, put on 2 layers of clothing, and EXERCISE in line!?

“It’s only a mile. Too easy,” were Alan’s words of wisdom. He probably said a lot more than that, but who could listen that early?

As we started to jog, and jog, and jog, I started to panic, and panic, and panic.

All I could think was, “I can’t feel my toes. My fingers are purple. I’m all out breath. This is never going to end. Ever. A mile is equivalent to 9 laps around the University of Alabama rec center gym, and I haven’t run in about 7 months.”

You might call me the little engine that couldn’t, maybe just wouldn’t, but it sure felt like couldn’t to me.

I tend to do drastic things if you push me too far. 20 degrees at 5 am, doing something I despise (running) definitely qualified.

I jumped out of formation. Alan, ever the dutiful husband, followed me with his mouth and eyes wide open.

“What are you doing!?”

“Not this!!!”

“April, are you okay? You can’t jump out of a formation run.” Alan has always excelled at PT. To bring along his brand new little wife, only to discover that she is in fact a fun run drop-out was alien to him.

I felt all sassy and rebellious. “No, *gasp for air* maybe you can’t, *more gasping for air* but I just did.”

(And this is why I will never be in the military.)

Alan sighed, “They’re going to make this loop and end up back where they started from, so let’s just stand behind this bush and then jump back in when they come back around. Maybe no one will notice,” Alan reasoned, trying to make it look like he didn’t actually have a rebellious and un-physically fit wife.

“Why!? I don’t care if they know. I don’t care. Running is stupid. Especially at 5 am in the freezing butt cold.”

Somehow he convinced me to jump back in at the end, but from that point on, I didn’t have to worry about ever being encouraged to participate in any unit sports days again. Thank goodness!!!

Alan at work

Story #3 The Red Leg War

The last week before graduation, which was the beginning of January, they took the Lieutenants out to “the field.” In the military “the field” just means they are going out to train and make pre-tend war in the wilderness.

Alan was an artillery officer, so that meant it was a week of constant BOOMS.

Meanwhile, I had nothing to do whatsoever. I went into it thinking I would do a ton of Bible study.  Yeah. I was 21, and I had never had a week with no chores, no job, and no responsibilities before.

What did I actually do? I stayed up late playing video games on the computer, and I tried to sleep late.

I TRIED to sleep late, but there was this maid. Every morning without fail, this woman would arrive at 9AM!! 9 am!! All I wanted to do was sleep until 12 pm, but this tiny Korean lady, who spoke little English, was relentless. She’d knock and knock, and then she’d let herself in. Remember, we were living in a hotel.

I tried being nice.

“No, no. No cleaning today. It’s not dirty.”

That’s my nice way of saying go away, but she wouldn’t hear of it.

So everyday she’d come. Everyday I’d try to think of a way to make her stop coming so early, and everyday I’d fail.

Thankfully, it was only a week.

Then Alan returned, smelling like I’d never smelled a person smell before. Apparently, Army guys don’t shower in the field.

We attended his big graduation ceremony, and I felt a tiny twinge of sadness that I’d missed my own college graduation, but I brushed that aside. It was a tiny sacrifice in the big scheme of things. We were off on a great adventure, and we were packing up and heading to Texas.

In only a matter of DAYS, we’d FINALLY have our first true home together.

Click here to read last week’s chapter in this series of the Real Army Wives.

For the NEXT chapter in this series, check back next Monday, or sign up below to receive each new chapter in your inbox!

Want to start at the beginning of this series? Click here for my September 11, 2001 story.

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The post Rookie Army Wife: 3 Misadventures in Oklahoma appeared first on Stories of Our Boys.

In the Empire State Building

While Alan was at OBC (military training) in Oklahoma, and I was finishing my degree at Alabama, Alan had this spontaneous idea to meet for the weekend in New York City!!

New York City!!

Y’all. To fully understand why this was such a big deal, I should explain that I was not accustomed to this sort of thing. We did not take annual vacations or move from state to state. I lived in Alabama my entire life.

But for as long as I can remember, I have always been a dreamer and a wanderer.

If you look hard enough, you can spot the Statue of Liberty to the left of my head.

I love excitement.

Alan brought a degree of excitement that I had always yearned for. I couldn’t help it. My Aunt Ann, who I adore, used to joke that as a baby my first word was “Go!”

Traveling and seeing new places, sleeping in hotel rooms, and just roaming in general is something I love.

I do not love trying to relax in a hotel room while my 10-year-old and 11 year-old laugh and joke in the bed beside me, interrupting my every thought……but this was years before I had to deal with that. (Those are today’s problems…)

Me in Times Square

My first flight alone

We used the free ticket we saved from when we missed the ball, so we only had to buy one plane ticket. Then we went online and found the very cheapest room in Manhattan that had a private bathroom. (Yes, you can get hotel rooms in NYC that are community bathroom situations….no thank you.)

I was a tiny, timid, clueless, but giddy 21-year-old newlywed college senior. I had only flown twice before, and both times had been since I married Alan.

You wouldn’t believe how nervous I was about flying, by myself, into the biggest city in America to meet my husband inside an airport, take a bus to the subway in Queen’s, and then ride the rails to Manhattan to find our hotel on foot.

Sure, we’d been to a foreign country together, but somehow this seemed scarier. New York City? Queens? Isn’t this a place where people get mugged and there are gangs and people on drugs?

So yeah, I was all full of anxiety, but it wasn’t all bad. It was a happy nervous.

The hardest part was finding Hotel Pennsylvania on foot. You see, this was before iPhones and GPS. Back then, it was just us and some maps and kind strangers giving us directions.

I’ll never forget my first subway ride.

We boarded the train. I’d seen my share of Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtle movies as a kid, so I approached the whole subway thing with great fear and trepidation, let me tell you.

Graffiti was everywhere. Just like in the movies. Thankfully, there were no foot soldiers working for Shredder out that day.

Alan was a little nervous too, though he may never admit it. I know he was because he said stuff like, “Turn your ring around. Keep your purse zipped up.”

I have a happy-go-lucky demeanor, and I think people worry about me sometimes.

Sure enough, the subway train was packed, and this man was walking down the aisles preaching about the Kingdom of Heaven. At first I just thought that was interesting, but then I realized he was doing that to get money from people because after he preached he went down the aisles collecting cash.

Now there was a head scratcher. I’ve been on many trains since then. That’s the only time I’ve ever seen someone pull of a stunt like that one.

Ground Zero Oct. 2002, a year after 9/11.

Saving Money in New York City

You are probably picturing Alan and me as poor college students. How could we afford this? Well, we were not poor college students. I was in school, but I had scholarships, and Alan had already graduated, and had an excellent job.

Lieutenant pay may not be much, but for two young twenty-somethings with no kids, it was everything we needed and then some.

While we were well provided for, we were still smart and careful with our money, but Manhattan was shockingly expensive. Alan to this day tells the story of paying $25 for a small pizza from Pizza Hut, and when he tells it, it was more like $40.

Broadway plays that last-minute were $200/ticket, so that was out.

I think that’s my only regret from that trip. I still want to see a Broadway show.

We did a lot of going TO places without actually paying any money and going into anything.

Statue of Liberty?

It had a long line and a fare to ride the ferry, so we squinted at it from the shore.

Empire State Building?

We were afraid it cost money to go up to the top, so we just walked inside the lobby, looked around the gift shop, and left.

Bloomingdale’s?

We walked around in it for a minute and then moved on.

Tour Bus?

No, thanks. We took the subway the entire trip, and we did a TON of walking.

Refills? What!?

I still remember our surprise when we realized that the restaurant was charging Alan for each of his Dr. Pepper refills. Ha! I’m pretty sure he drank water the rest of the weekend.

……..Overzealous frugality aside, I love that we took that trip.

I still remember so much of that weekend vividly. We argued some, especially over the Empire State building thing. One of us thought we were being overly cheap. We were!!!

But how often do you get to spend a weekend in New York City just wandering around?? I loved seeing Times Square and the UN and Trump Tower, in person. Yes, it was famous even 15 years ago.

We did buy souvenirs.

At the UN, we bought a blue tea set from Romania, which still resides in my china cabinet.

And from street vendors, as in the kind who whip their goods out of a black garbage bag, I bought a fake Kate Spade purse and a drawing of the city.

The purse broke the first time I tried to use it, and I have never made another black market purchase.

I don’t remember saying good-bye to Alan and parting ways again, though somehow we did.

I only remember the sights and sounds of this huge city, unlike anything I had ever seen before. Alan carried me on his back when my feet got too tired from the walking. I can tell you how the icy wind blasts between the skyscrapers.

We remember how friendly New Yorkers were to us. One couple on the train even told us to follow them when we got off to show me Bloomingdale’s.

I was also surprised that there were “newsstands” everywhere. They’re like mini-gas stations, only with no gas and tons of periodicals.

We saw Ground Zero, which was literally a giant hole in the fall of 2002.

Just thinking about that trip brings a smile to my face a mile wide because even with all the stress and anxiety and nervousness, it was an adventure, and we loved it.

Or at least I loved it. I hope Alan did too.

With Alan I felt safe there, and the future looked fun and close. Before long, we really would be together like a normal married couple, and we would experience things like this together.

Being a military wife was awesome, everything I’d ever wanted. How I couldn’t wait to get on with it already!

*****Come back each Monday for  the next story!*****

The post Real Army Wives Series: New York City appeared first on Stories of Our Boys.

It’s been a couple of weeks since my last Real Army Wives series post, so where were we?

Oh, yes, Alan and I were engaged. The Army was starting to encroach on my plans and change my life. Hahahahahaha Oh boy, did I have no idea what was ahead or what!

Behind? You can catch up here with part 1, part 2,and the others weren’t exactly part of the story, per se, so we are really only on part 3 here.

Probably 99% of military couples plan their wedding date around a deployment, a move, a temporary duty assignment, or training.

For us, it was Officer Basic Course and my own college graduation. We could plan it for December or January, which was unstable because we were brand new to the military and didn’t know if that would work out…

Or we could plan the big day for August, exactly when Alan had about 10 days of leave between assignments.

So we went with the August plan.

Picture of a picture….Yes, we got married before digital photography was big…Funny story….A guest that we didn’t know caught the bouquet. She said, “Wow! I don’t even know her!” So Alyson, Alan’s cousin, snatched it up. That makes me smile.

The first good-bye

I said good-bye to Alan around May 30 that year. He was off to Ft. Lewis, Washington, and I was headed down to my parents’ house to spend the summer working, planning the wedding, and taking Genetics via distance learning.

This was our first ever attempt at a long distance relationship. Two whole months–which sounds laughable NOW.

But, oh! The drama!

You would have thought it was World War II, rather than…..Tacoma. We hugged and kissed, and made speeches, and it actually makes me roll my eyes and shake my head now to even think about it. Gracious.

Two months of separation between Alan’s commissioning and the wedding.

But that was nothing.

Once we got married, in August, we celebrated with a honeymoon to Jamaica, and then we drove from Alabama to Oklahoma to settle him into his BOQ. (Batchelor Officer’s Quarters)

I rode out there with him, spent a day there, and then I flew back to Alabama to finish my own degree, at the University of Alabama.

Yep. That was another 4 months of separation.

I don’t even think it’s that uncommon for military couples to spend the first months of their marriage apart. This has been a common theme throughout millenia of military couples.

As a newlywed 21-year-old young woman, it was agonizing.

How many times did I contemplate throwing it all out the window and moving to Oklahoma with my lieutenant? So many times! I could finish my degree anywhere, any time, why bother with all this? Ugh.

But my husband truly loved me, and was always looking out not only for his best interest, but for mine as well. Alan would not hear of me throwing away my degree only 4 months from completion.

Transferring to another college would have put all those credits at risk. I’d worked hard on this degree, and we both decided it would be best for me to stick it out and finish that last semester at UA.

…Even if I felt like I was the only married lady on campus. Actually, I wasn’t the only one, but I WAS the only married gal still working as a Resident Assistant, living alone, in the freshman girls’ residence hall, Tutwiler.

My 3 closest friends junior and senior year: That’s me, Jennings, Leigh, and Chrisynda

But I was with my friends, and that made it doable. How many times have my friends kept me sane over all these years? Two things, y’all, there were two things that always got me through these obstacles.

1. My faith in my heavenly Father. He’s seen me through too much for me to ever doubt Him.
2. The support of my friends and family.

Around that time, speculation began to circulate about the possibility of war with Iraq.

It was the fall of 2002. We had troops in Afghanistan, not in Iraq, but the news kept building. I remember the day Chrisynda came to my room to tell me to turn on my t.v.

Chrisynda and me, 2002

Chrisynda was one of my best friends, a tallish, slender brunette with straight shoulder-length hair, and a positive attitude. She was the Alan of my friends: super responsible, practical, level-headed, beautiful, kind, caring, and fun, but always well-balanced.

She’s just one of those people who seems to know things. She was the friend who would keep my favorite snack in her room. She’d come to my room with a Walmart bag containing batteries because she knew that if she wanted to watch t.v. in my room, someone would need to put batteries in my remote control. April did not have money to spare for batteries. For Guthrie’s fried chicken tenders? Yes, I had money for that. For batteries? Never.

I remember Chrisynda came into my room, and she probably brought food with her too, and she turned on the news. It is permanently lodged in my brain how she asked me about the Iraq news.

“Did you see this Iraq stuff?”

I muttered something about avoiding all that news and hoping it wouldn’t happen. I like to live happily in denial.

“Ehh…I’m pretty sure we’re going, April. It’s happening. Do you think Alan will go?” She was so polite, but she leveled the facts with me that I don’t think anyone else wanted to talk about.

Time stood still. Wait. What? I gotta start watching the news? The news….the news…

The news was suddenly intruding into my life. It was more than a channel to flip past. What we were seeing on t.v. was affecting me directly. It had always affected me, whether I realized it or not, but now I was in the front of the line of dominoes!!

Ever since, I’ve never been able to form a non-partial opinion on anything politically related. I always think, “Wait. How will this affect me? Or this friend, or my parents, or my children?”

Some people remain objective much better than I do, but I cannot do it.

So there we were…..young newlyweds…we’d been apart for 6 months, with short breaks in between, and now there was talk of war with Iraq.

The questions swirled around me, but what could I do? How could I know anything?

All a person can do in any situation at all is to put one foot in front of the other. Do the next thing. What needs to be done today? Do that. How do I stay spiritually and physically fit to handle all this? Do that too.

Pray. Hope. Love. Cling to the good. Always hope for the best but prepare for the worst, and life went on.

Come back next Monday for the next installment!

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The post Army Wives Series: The First Good-bye and Watching the News appeared first on Stories of Our Boys.