thinking

Sitting here, listening to my husband talk to his mom on the phone. She's coming up this weekend to spend some time with him before he deploys. I'm really excited that she will be here soon... I positively love my mother-in-law. And I think it will be good for him to see her again before he deploys.
Just thinking about the limited amount of time we have left, and all the things about him I'm going to miss. The way he absentmindedly plays with any object nearby when he's talking on the phone, the look of pure concentration that covers his face when he's seasoning our meat for the grill, or the way he glances periodically through the window of our house to see what I'm up to while I'm inside talking to a friend and he's outside smoking a cig.
This man is my world, and I admire so many things about him. He has helped me become a better person. There were so many negative things about myself that needed improvement before I got back with him. He helped me see these things, without pointing them out a bit.
The world is a better place for having him as a soldier. And I couldn't be happier to say he's mine.

Reminiscing

Last night, I got home from work and did my normal, monotonous routine. I changed into comfy clothes, played the wii for about 30 minutes (mastered the basketball hoop shoot, which I have absolutely NO talent at in reality, so I'm quite pleased with myself), then decided I wanted to take a run.

I changed into my running clothes, stretched, then walked to the high school I attended. When in high school, I had been in MCJROTC and had to run around the school twice, which I likened to about a mile and a half. I thought, "EHHH, only been 8 years since high school, I'm in great shape! I can do this!". So, I broke out in a jog. The evening was warm, and by about the first tenth of a mile I was wishing I had a water bottle. Better yet, an entire swimming pool doused over my sweat-drenched head. I continued to push myself, not really all that tired, but HOT. Once I came to the ROTC building, glanced at the waving Marine Corp flags, yellow-painted cadet footprints on the road, and tried ineffectively to push back the wafting memories... I realized I am JUST NOT IN AS GOOD OF SHAPE AS I WAS. aka I'm getting old. Shhh, don't tell anyone. I walked past the baseball fields. Two men, baseball coaches in tiptop shape, took one look at my beet red face, jogging shorts, and droopy shoulders, and immediately began whispering and giggling. Gee thanks, that's all I needed for my already wounded ego. I ran the rest of the way back to my house- a good half mile at least, then graciously doused myself with a water bottle.
I love being in shape. I intend, this summer while in New York with my husband, to get BACK into shape. With all the PT he will put me through after reading this, I'm sure I won't have a problem. Thank you, honey!

Dippy Doo teacher, who!?!?

Man, do I feel like a complete dippy doo, do-do. I am a 3rd grade teacher, and we are wrapping up the school year (only 2 days left, whooo!!). In order to be released from our contractual duties, we must do several things. I was working on one of them after school today. Last year, my first year teaching, we had to pull the kids' cumulative folders (self explanatory, a collection of important documents from their schooling) to add pertinent documents. IN these cumulative folders are "yellow folders", as we educated people so poorly refer to them (they are folders that are, indeed, yellow, but serve the purpose of assessing the kids' progress on reading fluency, comprehension, etc.). Last year we were to pull the WHOLE cumulative folder from the filing cabinets and put our documents in their cum's. Apparently, this year we were NOT supposed to do this. We were only supposed to pull the yellow folders. Well, guess who missed the memo. I took 40 minutes to go through ALL OF THE 3rd GRADE cum folders in the file cabinet, diligently pulling out all 24 of my kiddos. As I was walking out of the office, the office secretary made a little gasping sound, like she was unable to breathe (which my mistake might have momentarily caused a collapse of the vital organ!!). She informed me of my dippy doo mistake, then smiled brightly claiming she would "file them all back tomorrow, no need to worry!". This, of course, spurred even more humiliation. I did NOT want her to have to do any extra, backbreaking work because of my ignorance. I left the office, practically in tears, then got all my documents filed in my cum's. Tomorrow, I AM FIXING THIS, NOT HER. Hopefully with minimal humiliation.

Pre-deployment issues

So, as much as I love to write, and especially considering my rather naive self-image of my talent, it's rather shocking that I have NEVER had a blog. What a great way for me to express myself, especially during this pre-deployment cry-my-eyes-out-smile-and-love-life-10-minutes-later-stage.
My husband is deploying June 22nd... or is it August 1st? Or is it later in the year? If you know the Army well, you know the likelihood of a SET set deployment date is very slim. Especially, it seems, with my husband's particular unit. I think we have been told 26 different deployment dates/locations, thus causing me to give up a perfectly good apartment (which turned out to be a blessing, more on that later), rent a $300 storage unit (non-refundable, mind you!), and almost take my poor mongrel cats for a huge surgery (ok ok, just declawing, but to me, that's huge!) to accommodate for our new living situation.
Now I'm not complaining. I absolutely do love the Army life. I respect and admire my husband for his expertise in his field, as well as his fiery attitude towards anything patriotic. I am beyond proud of him, and I hope my complaints do not reflect otherwise. There are just times that the Army tries my incredibly strong patience.