Reflections

Something about packing and moving has me a really crazy reflective mood. Tonight I was packing up a desk drawer and came across pictures of the kids when they were tiny.....ultrasound pics of both of them...so of course I started thinking about everything and everybody else in my life.

I really didn't think it would be this hard for me to leave this place. I've hated it since we got here. I've hated being so close to "home" and all of my misdeeds as a teenager and a 20something. Being this close...ahh..it just wasn't a good thing in my mind. The saying, "You can never go home" has always been my mantra...because I never wanted to go home.

Sitting here reflecting over who I am, who I have become over the last few years. I don't know who that other person was. I kind of look like her again...which is good, but the rest of her I don't know. At 37 years old, I know I have found "me". I know I'm ok with me. I've prided myself on being a tough loner who didn't need people. Friends, family...whatever...they were disposable.

I have let myself wear so many labels over the years, given by myself and by others...and that was ok. I have changed so much that it's really laughable looking back. I'm not tough. I'm not a loner, and I DO need people. And that's something I have only discovered in the last 3.5 years. So many people have come through my life since we came into the Army, some good, some bad...but they have all affected me in some ways. I've lost friends over stupid stuff, grown distant from people I was close to, grown closer to people I never thought I would. So many people! Cari, Brittany, Beth, Kim, Janie, April, Angela, Jessi, Krystala, Natalie, Sarah, Lura, Amber, Gina, Rebecca, Michelle, Staci, Elizabeth, Alison, Kristin, Stephanie, Leanna, Vanessa, Sabrina (and if I didn't name you it just mean my brain can't count that high these days!)...so so so many more that I can't even name them all...they've all touched me in some way...whether they know it or not. I treasure the ones I still have and regret that the ones who are gone. 

Being this close to home I've been able to reconnect with elementary and high school friends that I never thought to have in my life still. Instead I've gotten to meet Sheryl's sweet baby and party with MK and her husband's "hair band" and catch up with so many more. It has been amazing.

Leaving here has got me on such an emotional roller coaster right now. You forget how much you go through together when you lean on each other through deployments. You laugh, you cry, you hold each other up and do what you can for each other when they need something. I will never sit on a patio with a glass of wine without remembering those nights during deployment with Kim, Alison, Beth, Michelle, Cari, Natalie, Vanessa and Rebecca. SO many crazy nights when we could have been crying alone but instead had the support and laughter of others just like us..

For all the good stuff there has been probably an equal amount of drama. Most of it senseless. Some of it cleansing. I guess all of it has had it's purpose in some way or another. Everybody says you'll make new memories with new people at a new post, but ya know....I don't think anything can compare to the experiences and people I have met here. They've all been amazing in their own ways and I will treasure that forever.

So with 12 days to go before we leave Fort Campbell, KY....can't say I'm in a great emotional place and expect it to only get worse as they days fly by and moving day draws nearer. First instinct is to distance myself and be emotional unavailable...but I would only be robbing myself of the amazing people in my life.

So off to try to get rid of the lump in my throat, the tears in my eyes and enjoy the hell out of the next 12 days.