Why the nutshell? I don’t know. Basically, this is a little overview of my trip, and then you can bet I will type out a whole series about each individual place. It was a sweltering week in Italy. Most places were not air conditioned. And I am going to tell you all about it.

Days one and seven were traveling days, so this is very quickly going to look more like five days in Italy, I think.

As I mentioned on Facebook, we did fly military space available. Our tickets to Italy, believe it or not, were only $22 a piece. Crazy, huh? Our tickets home were $40/piece.

I promise I am going to write out a little guide on how to fly military space available. My husband even made a video with me about military flights while we were beginning our trip. I need to finish it off, and then I will post it here for everyone who is interested.

First, I want to say that this trip was to celebrate our wedding anniversary, and it was a beautiful vacation.

Alan especially loved touring Italy. We saw so many historical sites and a couple of volcanoes, so this was right up Alan’s alley.

The version of Italy we saw was dictated by our military arrival and departure destinations. That is why we stuck to Rome, Naples, and Sicily.

We both enjoy historical sites, so I am a little embarrassed to admit that while we were in the southern area with all the beautiful water and island destinations in a heat wave, we did not visit the beach.

It is okay though. We did visit the Mediterranean Sea when we were in Israel. Plus, we knew we would have some beach days when we got back to the U.S.

I think the phrase I said the most during our trip was, “planes, trains, and automobiles.”

Did you ever see that movie? It felt like we spent a bulk amount of this trip on planes, trains, and automobiles. Oh yeah, and also buses. Don’t worry though. Nothing caught fire, and no one had to sell shower curtain rings.

Please note the photo above. At the beginning of Day one of flying to Italy, we looked tidy and well groomed. Then we waited all day for our plane to leave. Then it took us around eleven hours of flying, plus many time zones to pass through.

So by the next photo, it was technically day two, though we had not been to a hotel yet or changed clothes or showered. We were riding this 140mph speed train to Rome that I was nervous about. That is why I looked like THIS on the train:

Embarrassing. I do hope I combed my hair before I got off the train, but I doubt that I did. Thankfully, we did ride straight to our hotel and freshen up. Oh, and you would never know that train was going so fast. I could not tell. It was not bad at all.

A lot of this vacation revolved around planes, trains, buses, and automobiles though.

The day we planned to ride the train from Rome to Napoli, our cab driver informed us that there was a national train worker strike. (So glad he told us!!) The strike was scheduled to last all day long, so all buses were booked up. (In Italy, they schedule their strikes.) However, since it was about 40 degrees Celsius/104 degrees Fahrenheit, the government stepped in and ended the strike in the late afternoon.

Our solution was simply to stay an extra day in Rome to wait out the strike. That ended up being my favorite day in Italy.

Then on the day that we planned to fly from Napoli to Catania (way down in Sicily), there was an airline worker strike!

You cannot make this stuff up, so we got the LAST two train tickets that day from Napoli to Catania.

By the way, it was an eight hour train ride. Also, our seats were not together.

The cool thing about the train ride though is that the TRAIN takes the ferry between the mainland boot and the island of Sicily. During the ferry ride, we had to switch trains. Then we were able to get out and look out over the water on the ferry!

That was a one of a kind experience for sure.

Overall, we did this whole week-long anniversary trip to Italy for only $2,138. Can you believe that? And we did not slum it. We stayed in what I would consider nice hotels (often Navy lodges) and paid for many cab rides and restaurant meals.

So what did we actually DO in Italy?

Well, besides studying train schedules and surviving the insane heat wave, we mostly saw Rome and Pompeii and rode trains.

We ended up spending three days in Rome. In Rome, we saw the sites we had heard about the most:

-the Colosseum

-The Titus Arch

-some other archway

-a basilica designed by Michelangelo

– the Vatican Museum

-the Sistine Chapel

-Italian restaurants

-the Trevi fountain

-the Spanish steps

-graffiti in all of the non-historic areas

-all sorts of beautiful buildings that I could not name

-bus stations

-train stations

-the best dressed population I have ever seen…Italian women do NOT dress as we do when out touring the city.

I look forward to writing a whole post on the Rome days and another post about our Pompeii day.

It was so hot in Pompeii that when I think about Pompeii, all I can think about is, “Man, that place was so hot. I almost passed out that day.”

Fortunately, I’m not prone to fainting. If you are, do not visit Pompeii in a heat wave. Pack water, and wear a big hat.

Overall, our Italy trip was a little stressful (for me) and exhausting (surely for both of us) and oh-so-crowded everywhere. I kept reminding myself to be grateful though.

I knew this was a luxury and a very kind thing that Alan was doing for us, and I did think it was cool to visit so many famous places.

Crowding into train after train, standing room only, and wondering why nowhere was air-conditioned is not how I envision a relaxing vacation. There was very little relaxing involved in this trip.

When I am crowded into a D.C. train I do not feel this stressed even though it is the same. In a foreign country where I did not know the language, I just felt far out of my comfort zone.

But mostly, the problem was the heat.

At some point in Rome day three, I sat down on my hotel bed and said, “I am not going anywhere else today. I do not even want dinner. All I want to do is lie here, sleep, and let the swelling in my ankles go back down.” And that is exactly what I did.

Y’all, I was never good at extreme heat! Two different years back in high school I called my band director trying to quit because I could not take the endless days of one hundred degree sun in band camp. Somehow he always managed to talk me out of quitting. The sun and I are not friends.

Alan, on the other hand, absolutely loved touring Italy and enjoyed the freedom of not being with a tour group.

He was downright exuberant. “Oooo let’s take a picture here. Let’s take a picture of this,” he said so many times. I was always a little shocked. It was so incredibly hot that I had a hard time caring about what I was seeing or taking photos. Plus, I wished I had my tennis shoes and an ice water, all the time.

There is a good lesson to take from this. Wear tennis shoes. My flip-flops were comfortable, but they strained my legs because it had been a year since I had worn them. My feet are used to tennis shoes.

I will tell you all the details in my next few posts!

For my next vacation, I told Alan I am willing to fly military flights. However, I would like to pick a quiet place on the coast and not change hotels at all.

The post Our Sweltering 7 Days in Italy in a Nutshell appeared first on Stories of Our Boys.

I’m not going to church this up. Let’s just call it like it is. Moving was a j-o-b.

Getting our Georgia house ready to sell, selling it, finding a rental, and moving in was exhausting. Helping all our boys adjust to life at a new school…that part was far more difficult than I expected. I am not always the best at realistic expectations.  Moving is a task that keeps giving and giving.

Moving, ah…moving.

This is the first time we’ve moved back to a duty station where we’ve actually lived before, so that has made a world of difference in adjusting to this one. It was 100 times easier this time, but there was still so much change.

You know what I’ve done to get through it?

Now this is the part where you’re expecting me to say, “read my Bible and pray,” if you know me at all.  Well, that’s true. I have done those things almost everyday, and the importance of that cannot be exaggerated.

But what I was actually going to say is I’ve been taking this transition s-l-o-w-l-y.

I have signed up for a fractional amount of things. Seriously almost nothing. On Thursdays, I pack folders for a couple of my sons’ teachers at school. It takes me maybe 20 minutes. Even that I have trouble remembering!

At church, I am responsible for nothing at all.

Now this isn’t always how I intend to live, but when I first move, I’m not ready to go out and meet the city and save the world, ya know? I’d rather have a circle of friends who I chat with and then go home. Let me sort of ruffle my nest and adjust the hairs and twigs for a while. I gotta make sure each little egg is safe and sound, and there are FOUR of them. Once I’m sure I have our nest all shored up good and ready to face the wind, then I will be more ready to go flying about to help the other robins.

There’s enough on my mind and in my home to keep me busy for a while yet. It took me until November just to figure out where I unpacked the “fall decor” box, and now it’s about time to hang Christmas decorations. I’m debating whether I should even bother with the fall stuff.

It’s been important for me to not go overboard in taking on too many responsibilities right away. Seeing everyone through the transition has been enough stress on its own.

However, it IS equally important to not be isolated. 

We still all go to church together as a family, walk together to school most mornings, and socialize with neighbors. The boys also each have an activity they enjoy, well, except for our 5-year-old because I only put tiny mites in activities if they beg for it, (and I’ll save the reasons for that for a future post).

I had an advantage in moving here that I’ve never had before. I already knew people, not just people, but people I actually like, so right off the bat I had a support system. Normally, when you are new in town, you have no support system at all.

If you are reading this, and you moved this year, I hope you will make an extra effort to build a support system.

Don’t wait for people to come to you. Usually they don’t. Go out and find your people. Join a military spouse club, or a MOPS, or church. When you go to church, don’t just attend the service without joining a “small group” or Sunday school class. Invite people you meet for a play-date or a cup of coffee.

Friend people you meet in your new town on Facebook, when you don’t even know them that well yet. You need to get that news feed hopping with local events rather than stuff from far away that you can’t go to.

The newcomer phase can get depressing fast when you aren’t plugged into anything, and you have no one to share holidays with.

I’m not saying sign up for a ton of leadership positions your first year in a new place, though. I’ve found it best to participate the first year, get to know the people, and then you can decide if you want to serve or lead or keep on participating. Believe me, I have found out the hard way, there is an actual limit to the amount of stress a person can handle. I’ve reached that limit a few times over the years.

The Kids

Seeing the kids through this transition wasn’t a piece of cake either, but our boys are pros at this too, bless their hearts. This was their 3rd move in 4 years, as crazy as that sounds. We left here in 2014, lived in California until 2016, and then lived in Georgia until 2018. That’s three moves in 4 years.

When we left here, 2 were school-aged. Now all 4 are school-aged, and that took the challenge level to a whole new level. Helping four separate humans navigate a total world and school change was work.

That first quarter at a new school never results in our best grades. Each school has different rules, methods, and expectations. Yes, I even tried home-schooling to mitigate this problem, but that wasn’t so wonderful either. You can read more about that here.

going down the slide at a local pumpkin patch

Don’t lose patience with your kids when the transition doesn’t go as smoothly as you’d hoped.

A quiet lunch with no one to talk to is depressing for anyone. Figuring out which classes are ahead of your last school and which ones are behind doesn’t take too long to figure out, but then you have to rise to that challenge too.

Which kids are the nice ones, and which kids are terrifying? There’s no way to know but observation and trial and error.

The #1 Best Thing We Do For Our Kids to Make This Transition Easier

I have found time and time again that the best way to help our children to make the social part of the transition, which let’s face it, is just as huge as the academic portion, is to look for families like our own and hang out with them before school starts.

Sometimes meeting people is easier than others. The best way to find like-minded families is to attend a church near your neighborhood and get involved in community events right where you live.

Don’t drive 40 minutes away to find a good church or swim club if there’s one right in your backyard. Having friends that live too far away to see everyday is not going to help your kids nearly as much as having friends down the street.

For example, is there a local pool you  can join? Do it! And take your kids regularly just so they can start seeing familiar faces and making connections. Observe which families don’t get on your nerves, and invite them to meet you at the pool the next day.

All of that is exactly why I prefer to move in the summer– early summer, so we can do as much of our adjusting as possible before school even starts.

Don’t ignore the Facebook Groups.

What about when you just don’t seem to be meeting anyone at all? Some places are like that. Hop on Facebook, and search for your community name to see if there’s a group you can join. I know when we moved here we met one of our friends because she put on the local community Facebook page that she was looking for someone in the neighborhood with a 2nd grader to meet at the local park. So I took my 2nd grader on over to the park and met them!

eating lunch at school with Daniel

So how are we this time, 5 months in?

All considered, we’re doing well. This was not an easy year, but it wasn’t a bad year either. My oldest played flag football for the first time. That’s a neat thing about moving. It seems like we try new things with each move. He’s also learning Spanish, so I’m getting a good refresher on mine, as I study with him.

Our 5th grader is learning to play saxophone as well as taking an after school computer class where they are teaching them how to make movies on iMovie. I’m hoping when he’s done, he’ll share the wealth and teach me some of what he learned.

Daniel, our 2nd grader, is going through a phase where he wants to sign up for sooooo many things! He’s ice-skating (so he can eventually play hockey) as well as taking karate. He’s asking me to sign up for baseball and swimming too, and somewhere along the way, he’s going to have to let go of something!

John David is loving kindergarten. He sings “This land is your land, this land is my land,” constantly, and the neat thing is he knows verses that I don’t know. He’s suddenly Mr. Independent, no longer sitting in my lap (breaking my heart with that)  and putting on his own socks and shoes.

All of them seem quite content. Alan and I are doing well too. It think Alan is doing a little better than me. I’ve been going through sort of a crisis of life with all the changes, with no longer having a preschooler at home. And yet I still never feel like I get enough done.

Now that I think about it, out of all 6 of us, I may be doing the worst, and I’m not actually bad. I have close friends and plenty to busy myself with. It just takes time for me to fully feel settled in spirit at a new place, you know? Every single time it takes me about a year, and that is okay. You have to figure out what kind of adjustment phase works for you.

I was driving down the road to our house this morning with a car full of groceries, and all I could think was, “Wow. I can’t believe I’m living here again, in this beautiful neighborhood, in this bustling suburb of our nation’s capital.” I still love it, and I feel blessed and relieved to get to return to this place that I love. Yes, it takes me a while to adjust, but I am still so thankful to be here.

P.S.   Apparently moving is a huge deal for us too because my website is crawling with articles just like this one. Want to read more thoughts about moving? Go here for the “year after moving,” , or here for the 4 month moving update from our last move.

The post 5 Months Since the Move: How I Handle the Transition appeared first on Stories of Our Boys.

It’s been a month now since we moved into our new home in Virginia. It’s been 6 months since I blogged regularly, and there is so much I could tell you, I almost don’t know where to begin!

This move, our 10th as a military family, is complete. We are still fulfilling medical requirements and registering for things like school in the fall, but for the most part, we are finished.

It’s time to get back to blogging, which I can’t wait to do!

If you live nearby, and I haven’t paid you a visit yet, don’t worry, I will. And if you were afraid (or relieved-ha) I had given up writing completely, let me assure you that I haven’t.

I needed time off to focus on my family and this move, but at this point I’m really just sitting around playing the Jeopardy app on my phone, so… time to get back to work, eh?

Good-bye, Old House. Our Georgia friends will always hold a special place in our hearts.

End-of-year gifts from John David. Good-bye Pre-school.

Hello, moving boxes, you old rascal you.

Hello, RV and hotel stays.

Good-bye dear friends. Thank you for being there for us. I love this Georgia-shaped cutting board I received as a parting gift.

Hello again, moving truck. Better late than never… This is the tree-sized limb that almost fell on my rental car on moving day but missed it by a hair. Thank you, Lord, that it missed!! And thank you to my friends and neighbors who helped me clean up the debris.

Hello, new kitchen and hello to you too, you dear old boxes. Every single one of you showed up unharmed.

“Sometimes you gotta go where everybody knows your name…”

Returning to this place has been even more magical for us than I even dared hope.  The boys are running around with other boys all day long. The trampoline, which was mostly unused the past two years, is back in daily play. Bicycles are being ridden again. The sounds of children playing Nerf-war games echoes through my house.

Ahhhh yeah.

Alan has been on vacation for a month, so I feel like I am too. We are all on this restful, ridiculously long, staycation. I get to sleep as late as 8:30 in the morning some days, and going for walks on sidewalks in my own neighborhood is such a breath of fresh air.

But my favorite part is that everywhere I look there are friendly faces, both old friends and new friends too.

playroom photo wall

Moving to encouragement and familiarity, rather than to fresh new beginnings, was exactly what we needed. There’s a time for new adventures, but there’s also a time for returning home. We are lucky. We have many ‘homes.’

The v-tach is back.

This was especially timely as we had other worries. Right before we left Columbus, my heart began acting up again. It felt like a punch in the gut when my cardiology clinic called about my implanted monitor reading, saying that I needed to meet with an electrophysiologist about a possible ablation. (It’s a procedure where they go in through your leg with a catheter and burn off the cells of your heart that are causing the trouble.)

I’ve been trying to avoid having an ablation, but my heart keeps acting up. It’s all unsettling and tiring. What mom needs yet another thing to WORRY about???

Most days I’m fine. I’m not even a big worrier, but it’s there in the back of my mind. I pushed off the electrophysiology appointment. I’m going in July.

That’s why it’s that much sweeter that this move was to a place we hold dear, rather than to a new frontier, if you will. We have health issues to sort through and children to raise. It feels like the perfect time to be back in our beloved Virginia.

Thank you for welcoming us back.

Daniel, anxiously waiting at the door for his friends to arrive.

This summer we are memorizing Psalm 23 as a family. (Yes, even little John David). It felt fitting because it’s a short but mighty message, and God has taken such good care of us.

Psalm 23

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The post I have missed you, and I’m back. appeared first on Stories of Our Boys.

Alan and the boys, National Mall, Washington D.C., summer vacation 2017

Alan and our two boys on the National Mall, Washington D.C., when we first moved there in 2009

We have been officially notified that we’ll be moving back to the D.C. area this summer.

I SHOULD be like WAHOO!!  Let’s do this!! After all, I love D.C., and this is an excellent job opportunity for Alan. Plus, I’m moving close to so many friends. I love D.C. It’s like an entire metropolitan area of people who are ALL just as uptight as I am. These are my people!!!

But in the words of Forrest Gump, “I’m pretty tired. I think I’ll go home now.”

Oh, wait. Where is home??? Ya’ll, I’m just tired of the moving, the packing, the researching, the move-out cleaning, the de-cluttering, the stress, making the kids say good-bye to their friends….That’s the hardest part.

We are quite happy to return to an area that we loved, underneath all our anxiety. In fact, I have so much anxiety over this move, I’ve been unintentionally clenching my jaw as I scroll through hundreds of housing ads. It hurts to eat now.

Y’all!! The decisions are overwhelming, and we’ve lived there before. It feels like we just left D.C., but it’s actually been almost 4 years!

It’s mind-boggling, all these houses and schools and neighborhoods. I have to pick a house that comes with an acceptable elementary as well as middle school nearby now. I’m simply going to HAVE to do a re-con trip to go look at things for myself. We are in the process of planning that out too.

Caleb, age 2, by the fountain in front of the U.S. Capitol building

But wait. Why should I allow this move to make me so crazy?

I need to s-l-o-w down. Take a few deep breaths. Trust Alan. Trust God. Everything will work out just fine. And no, I may not get everything exactly how I want it, but it will all come together.

I taught a Sunday school lesson, to my class of 4th and 5th grade girls, this morning about Paul and Silas. They were arrested in Philippi for casting a demon out of a slave girl. They were beaten and thrown into prison. What did Paul and Silas do? Worry until their jaws hurt? No. They sang. They knew God had their back, and they weren’t worrying themselves silly. (Acts 16)

I guess if Paul and Silas could sing in prison with their feet in the stocks, I can sing through this move. After all, this move is a blessing anyway, a blessing that’s carrying us back to a place that we love.

God’s got this, so we got this too. Breathe. Calm down.

Me with the 2 oldest boys, at the National Archives, 2009

Want to see a few houses I’m looking at?

Just for fun, really because I won’t get up there until March to look around…but these houses are so beautiful.

See if you can guess which two are on a military base. The base is my back-up in case I can’t find a rental.

But y’all, I just don’t know if I can move back and NOT live in my old neighborhood, and none of those are advertising yet. We loved that place and those people so much, but it has to be right for all 6 of us. I’m hoping it will work out!

***All photos were obtained from zillow.com, with the exception of the on-post houses, which were obtained from here.***

Amazing, huh? These will all be gone by the time I’m ready to sign papers though. If any of you know of a rental coming open in my old neighborhood or surrounding area, be sure to let me know!

I’m beginning to calm down and get excited now! It’s time to do less worrying and more singing. Let’s have a little Faith Hill and Shelby Lynne and “Keep Walkin’ On!”

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*******This post is part of the series, The Real Army Wives. For last week’s post click here.*******

Guest Post from Cloe

Real Army Wives: The Mystery Checks

Today’s post is written by a good friend and fellow real Army wife of mine who is the inspiration for the character, Cloe. You can read more about her on this post. When I mentioned this to Alan, he said, “Oh yeah, Rob! That dude had to shave his face twice a day.” Oh, the things you remember…

Early Summer 2003

“What? What do you mean there isn’t enough in the account to cover this withdrawal?”

I stand in front of the bank teller counter confused. I’ve been the only one using the account for three months since my husband left for war. I thought I had a handle on this part of military life, even if I was only 20 years old.

The teller says she can pull the account history. Apparently, several checks just cleared and they were signed in my husband’s name.

I haven’t heard from him since he left- no letter, no email, no phone call. I had written to him at least once a week. Although I was in college, I didn’t know many people since I hadn’t lived near Killeen for long. Writing letters helped me feel closer to him.

I wrote him a different kind of letter this time: expressing my concern of the possibility of fraudulent checks or if it was him- I was really upset he spent that much money without thinking of how I would pay the bills! I had paid the rent by the “skin of my teeth”.

But I kept glancing at the account history and copies of the checks. I even called his dad and asked him to take a look at them.

Somehow each check had the date, amount, and signature written differently. Why were the dates sometimes numbers but others written as words? Some in cursive but others in print letters? Why was the signature not consistent? It made no sense to me.

In the letter I wrote, the first words were “We’ve got a real problem”!

I also sent him the bank paperwork to claim someone had committed check fraud, pretty serious stuff. I believed someone had stolen the few checks he took with him.

A few weeks later he called! I was so nervous to take his call, I had dreamed and wished for so long (3 months) to hear from him and talk gushy sweet nothings as newlyweds . But, it wasn’t the sappy call I was hoping for. He called because his command heard about the potential check fraud paperwork I had sent. His Lieutenant Colonel allowed him to call because they were concerned.

That’s when he breaks the news to me that he had never written a check before.

Seriously, at 20 he hadn’t written a check before???? I couldn’t believe he had actually written those checks. He said he really needed those items he bought at the PX in Kuwait.

I felt sort of bad for him, being in the midst of war and all, but I still asked him to rip up any remaining checks.

It was one of the first financial lessons we learned as a married couple.

–And looking back probably a clue into my love of accounting. To this day we still joke about one item he bought, which was new technology for 2003. It never made it home since within a few days of purchase it “fried” in the intense Iraq summer heat! So much for being “necessary.”

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It truly was a struggle trying to manage finances from 2 separate continents. You can’t predict the crazy things that will happen!

Thank you so much for allowing me to post your story, Cloe!

Click here for the next chapter in this series.

The post Military Finances: Newlyweds on 2 Separate Continents appeared first on Stories of Our Boys.

The Last Visit

For a few minutes there, people began to joke that the 4th Infantry Division was never actually leaving for Iraq. By the first of March of 2003, the whole division was still waiting, and the other division in town, the 1st Cavalry Division, had orders as well. Some of the 1st Cav guys began to joke that the 1st Cav would beat the 4th ID to the punch after all.

Alan’s parents came for their visit. I baked my first cake for Alan’s mom’s birthday.

DaddyO, Nonna, and Alan, during that last visit

DaddyO and Nonna handled all this with such brave faces, I honestly had no idea the level of stress they were feeling. (You will get to hear about this deployment from Alan’s parents’ perspective on next week’s post. I can’t wait to share that!)

The only thing I noticed at the time was that they called more frequently that month before he left. Obviously, they were also sitting on the edges of their seats sweating out Alan’s departure date. They watched enough Fox News for an entire retirement village, and this was before they were retired.

Alan’s mother was a middle school science teacher, and his father was a forester. Yet somehow they managed to watch the news around the clock.

Alan’s parents’ visit came and went, but Alan remained, still at home.

My 22nd birthday came, and I received happy birthday phone calls from 12 different people, a completely unprecedented occurrence that had never happened before or since.

I think everyone among our friends and family were waiting on pins and needles with us!

Dad, me, and Alan

My parents visited us too, along with my brother and sister. My sister, Amanda, is fully incapacitated. She was born with such severe brain damage, resulting from a random neural tube defect, that she was not expected to live past the age of two. Amanda cannot see, walk, talk, or do anything for herself.

As you can imagine, road trips weren’t something my family did a lot of. The 15 hour trip from Alabama to Texas was no small undertaking for them, but they did it.

Mom and Dad gave our new digs their stamp of approval, and we enjoyed showing them around Fort Hood.

I do not remember how we fit my entire family in our new, barely furnished home, but somehow we did.

My family’s visit came and went, and yet Alan remained, still at home.

March 17,2003

President George W. Bush gave Saddam Hussein a 48-hour deadline to leave Iraq. Of course, that order was ignored.

Shock and Awe

March 22, 2003 was the day of the famous “Shock and Awe” invasion of Baghdad. We still remember sitting in our little living room, watching the bombing of Iraq on our old-school 19- inch t.v.

I can still see Alan sitting in his little green recliner, eyes glued to the set. Watching Alan watch the bombing was entertainment in itself. Alan was excited and restless, in thick anticipation of going over there.

These men were a fire support team. There’s Alan on the back row, 2nd from the right.

After March 22nd, things sped up drastically.

We knew about 24 hours in advance. That call came on March 30th, and they said, “Bring your bags at 2pm.”

Everyone went down there at 2pm, loaded up the bags. We waited a while, and then they sent us all home until midnight, or some time in the middle of the night.

The details get fuzzy here, but I recall that after they sent us back home, we tried to just stay awake and enjoy our last night together. Rather than passing out on our bed, we ended up accidentally falling asleep in the living room.

It was a restless sleep, though. Before we knew it, it was the middle of the night and time to head back down there to say good-bye for an indefinite amount of time.

I just remember standing outside, in the chilly air, in a red sweater. The unit stood together in formation.  At some point, someone took this photo for us.

Deployment in the Middle of the Night

The soldiers then headed to a trailer where they waited for even more hours before they ever finally boarded a plane.

I snuck a three-page letter into Alan’s carry-on ruck sack for him to find on his 20 hour airplane ride.

After we said good-bye, I remember watching him walk away, wondering if he’d turn and look back. I think the first time he did, and then we hugged once more, but the last time he didn’t look back.

Then I walked–or stumbled–because I was so sleep deprived, to my car. I drove home in a haze of exhausted tears. By this point, it was around 4 am. I didn’t cry that much until I was actually in my car alone, driving home. At that point I could let the sobs flow freely.

I committed Alan to God’s care. We’d been married all of 7 months, and I had no idea as to when I would ever see Alan again.

“After this, the word of the Lord came to Abram in a vision:

‘Do not be afraid, Abram. I am your shield, your very great reward.”                           Genesis 15:1

Next chapter in this series:

Army Mom: Alan’s Mother Tells her Story

Want to catch up on this series? Check here to find what you’ve missed.

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The post Shock and Awe, March 22, 2003 appeared first on Stories of Our Boys.

Back then I loved unpacking all the boxes.

Moving into a new house always makes me euphorically happy.
What could thrill a feminine soul more than a fresh new house full of possibilities?

I vividly remember each “not it” home we looked at when we arrived in Texas in January, 2003. But then we found “it.” We found THE ONE.

It was a duplex, only 1-year-old, out-of-the-way from town but close enough to one of the Fort Hood gates. The entire neighborhood was all new and brick and beautiful. We had the classic scraggly baby tree in the front yard and tiny backyard with a privacy fence.

Our front yard was smaller than most folks’ living room, but it didn’t matter. It was ours, together at last, and we loved it.

A three-bedroom duplex at 22-years-old might as well have been a mansion, we were so delighted with every bit of it.

Our first home together

When you choose a home, you are picking much more than a floor plan and a fence type.

You are selecting, usually completely blindly, the main characters for the next chapter of your life. If you live in a duplex, chances are your neighbors will be mighty close at hand, so you’d better hope there’s a good one or two in there.

I guess that’s what made life on John David Drive so incredibly happy. Living there was one of those experiences I look back on in a haze of rose-colored glasses. Those people were my battle buddies, and most of them could do no wrong.

Yes, we even named our fourth son after that street because even in the midst of the hardship of sending Alan overseas to the War on Terrorism, at the very beginning of the thing, there were fun times.

We were so young. In many ways, we grew up in that house.

I moved in as a newlywed girl, fresh out of college. I remember standing at my sink and marveling that I was truly a married woman with my very own house, in my very own kitchen, and I giggled in wonder that it was all real.

Our first kitchen

Meeting the Neighbors

Right off the bat, our new main characters began to materialize.

It didn’t take more than a night in our new home to realize that our duplex-mates had some serious problems.

Some duplexes may be built better than others, but this one had a terribly thin shared wall, and the main rooms that sound came through were the master bedroom, master bath, and the kitchen.

I think the kitchen and the master bedroom were the two primary places that our neighbors did their yelling matches. It was quickly apparent that their marriage was not going to survive the upcoming deployment.

The disruptive neighbors were Dylan and Shelby and their 3 children. The oldest child was around 13, and he was actually Shelby’s son from a previous relationship. The other children were Hannah, age 8, and Houston, age 5. Hannah and Houston were two of the most beautiful, sweetest, and quietest children I ever met.

Dylan was a staff sergeant in the 4th Infantry Division, so he would be leaving when Alan left too.

We never got to know Shelby well. Shelby was a terribly sad case. She was the angriest, most foul-mouthed woman I’ve ever heard. It was disturbing to listen to their fights because you knew that the children were having to listen to them too, and it just always seemed like Shelby was tearing her own life apart with her own two hands.

But across the street from me, I noticed something much different and unbelievably coincidental.

I noticed that the across-the-street neighbor’s car had Alabama plates. Remember, we were in Texas. Most everyone had Texas plates. But not only did she have Alabama tags, she had Dale County plates!!! You see, in Alabama, the first 2 numbers of the license plates tell which county the car is registered in.

This wasn’t just an Alabama girl, this was a South Alabama girl!! Like me!! I’d lived there my whole life. How could this be? I was clearly going to HAVE to meet this person.

When I am thrown into a new place, with new people, I become very reserved and quiet and shy. The very idea of knocking on her door was scary, but I had to do it. We had too much in common to not meet.

I’d already noticed, through my neighborly front window observations, that her husband was also in the 4th Infantry Division. So he would be going too.  I also observed that he was of similar rank to my husband.

There was no way around my curiosity and need to meet people before my husband left. I MUST march across the street and knock on her door. This was not the time to play it cool.

Elsie

What I met there was a bubbly, adorable young blonde named Elsie, a nursing student who loved cats. I’m saying that in the past tense, but I can assure you that Elsie still loves cats.

I think we were instant friends. The day I met Elsie, Alan hadn’t even officially signed in to his unit yet. When you move, it’s wise to put your house in order before you go reporting for work, if at all possible.

So it was Elsie who gave me my first expected timeline for when our husbands would be shipping out. She said they were expecting to go in three weeks.

3 weeks!? 3 weeks. Three. Only three.

You might think that I was reeling, or depressed, or that maybe I was a mess. But I wasn’t a mess.

I was sad that I was losing the husband that I had waited through almost 5 months of marriage to finally be with. Naturally, I was concerned about his well-being and unsure of what I would do next.

The thing is I’m a naturally happy person, so I never wallowed in any self-pity at this point. I liked that no one knew exactly when 4th ID would be leaving because that meant there was wiggle room, so I prayed. I prayed for more days constantly.

“Let me have as much time as possible with him. Lord, I’m afraid we’ll forget each other if we don’t have a little time together first. I’m going to focus on enjoying each day we are given.”

That was truly my attitude. It had to be. When you are in a bad situation that is completely out of your control, what is the point of worrying and being depressed? It would not have helped. By staying upbeat, we could go on enjoying date nights to El Chico together and planning our future in this new place.

putting together the bed frame

At that point, Alan was still with me, so I couldn’t truly be sad yet. Plus, we had our very first house to set up, so while the future looked gloomy, there was enough happiness in the present that the gloominess couldn’t touch us….yet.

Join us next Monday for the next part in this series!!

For last week’s chapter, when we learned about deployment orders, click here 

For Chapter 1 click here.

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The post Beginning to Meet the Real Army Wives of 2003 appeared first on Stories of Our Boys.