Pet peeves

We all have them, those little things that people do, that just irritate the hell out of you. For some of us, it’s repetitive noise, someone popping their chewing gum. For someone else, it’s people not wiping their feet on the doormat, or waiting in a long line. I’ve come to the realization that there are pet peeves for as many of us are there are on the planet. I’d be lying if I did not say I had my own set of things that just have me seeing red, and turn me into a complete bitch. But here lately, it has changed, from people counting out change at the checkout (just break that 20 already), to something more important, something far more irritating.

“You knew what you were getting into”. I cannot count the number of times I have heard that, when I talk about Carl, when I talk about the worry, the stress, the aggravation of being with a soldier. It’s always some well-meaning, misinformed civilian soul who says it too, someone who has never been around the military, who has never had a soldier in their life, who has lived with the safety of normalcy.

And let me, for once, set the record straight. You have no idea what it’s like, the chaos you are fixing to get into, and the pain you are unleashing on yourself.

In the beginning, in the first blush of love, it’s all romantic. He’s Prince Charming in combat boots (mine still is that, but I digress). He looks so damned handsome in his dress a’s that you have the urge to start taking his clothes back off. The sight of his dog tags on his naked chest is sexy, and watching him walk in his acu’s has your heart tripping over itself. It’s a thrill to tug his pt shirt over your head, you learn Army-speak eagerly.

At some point in time, while you are cocooning yourself in love, sex, and sheets, reality is going to drop on your head. I can pinpoint the exact time, tell you where I was, and what I was doing, when the awful realization of what he does for a living hit me over the head. It was one of those moments, where it felt like God thumped me on the back of the head, and I struggled to keep my tears from falling onto the commendation he got in Iraq. It was a simply piece of paper, recognizing him for some accomplishment or another (I never did actually read it), and my vision blurred before I could suck in a breath. The next moment, my cheek was resting on his shoulder, smearing mascara on his dress shirt, and I was crying harder than I had in a long time.

Off topic, but I’ve cried more with him. He’s gotten more of my tears, more of my emotions, than any man has. I guess it’s because he has more of me than anyone else ever has, and it’s pulled my emotions to the surface.

There comes a day for every woman, every man, in a soldier’s life, when reality hits you, it’s a cold feeling, it sends chills up and down your spine, it made me nauseous, it made it hard to breathe. When I explained this to someone later on, someone much wiser in the world than I am, she patted my cheek, kissed my forehead, and told me that what I was feeling was death itself. I was struggling with the idea of his life in the military, struggling with my own emotions, wondering if I was strong enough for this life, and her words hit home with me. Death stalks us all, waiting for the moment, for the end of our lives. Most of us don’t feel it, don’t see it, don’t know the timer is going to run out, we’re too busy living in the here and now. But life with a soldier forces you to acknowledge the hourglass of life, that at some point in time, I’m going to roll over, whether I’m 30 or 80, and he’s not going to be here. It forces me to focus on the here and now, it makes every sunny perfect day a little bit more bright, it makes the fun moments all the more fun, it’s turned sex into something other than “let’s see who get off first”. It’s become something to pull us together, to keep us wrapped up in each other.

While I embrace this life, and all the heartache and hassle it means, while I treasure every moment, and bargain with God for more…. It still irritates me when someone tells me I knew what I was getting into. No, I didn’t. I had no clue as to what I was getting into, what I was doing to my perfectly ordered life. I launched myself into his world, and into his life, that is rapidly becoming our life, with no thought of what I was getting into. And I will never, ever, not as long as I live, regret it.

No matter where we may go, no matter what may happen, I will always be the sergeant’s girl.

~Jennifer