This weekend was the first time that I was really over the Navy. I told myself, Okay, I'm over it; it can be done now. When Joe left, I thought I got out all the crying I needed to in that one day, and figured I'd be fine because I am most certainly not the 16-year-old I was when he was last deployed. Sometimes I am so utterly wrong. Or maybe it's "wildly optimistic".
The military is an interesting concept, it's something I'm neither here nor there about. It puts people through incredibly difficult things that will mark them forever, it dictates their lives, but it also protects our country. It's also a choice.
When I was younger and much more aimless, I was very patriotic (mostly because that's how I was raised). I still am patriotic, but I also see a decline in our country in way I doubt it will ever bounce back. That's a whole other story. Now, as an adult formulating my own ideas about things based on how I see the world before my own eyes, I love where I was born and am very grateful for that, but also don't always love what we do.
All this to say, it's a bittersweet thing to appreciate and respect, when it makes life hard in a way that wouldn't otherwise exist. And a part of that is that I'm ignorant of strategic politics and warfare; I think, can we just be done now?
Saturday, some poo hit the fan - there's no better way to say it - and I was headed to a family gathering. I thought, Right now is about when I could really use a big bear hug from my big brother. And it became hard again.
I don't even know what the point of writing this is. I certainly don't want to guilt-trip him, or anyone else. It's just such a thing; it is such an inexplicable, unimaginable thing to deal with. It's not my choice, and I don't even have it the hardest. If my brother was here instead of training, I still wouldn't see him every day. Then there are those times, when you would see them, and you know what it would be like to get that hug you need...and it's just hard.
