Underneath My Armor, Part 6: Leaving Home

-Is it easy to move? I mean, away from your family


Yes and no.

Let me first say, I have it so much easier than the military wives of the past. Thanks to the internet, cell phones, house phones, communication is faster and better, than ever before. And while posting pictures on Facebook isn't always the same thing, and a phone call doesn't always feel the same way, it is more than other wives have had in the past.

With that said....
I have a huge, often chaotic, loud, loving, fiercely protective, family. That family taught me, whether they intended to or by accident, how to be independent, and strong. How to stand on my own two feet, lean into the wind, pull myself up by my boot straps, all those cliched, overused descriptions for strength that I can come up with.

In addition to all the life lessons about strength, I learned about how life changes. Like that famed river Heraclitus spoke and philosophized about, life is never the same. So I learned to be fluid, to change with the changes, rather than fight against them.

Finally, I know that should my world crumble around me, I can always, always, come home. I have come home several times, and rebuilt my life, put Humpty Dumpty back together again. You can go home again, and I have several times, whenever the world got to be too much, and I needed shelter and comfort.

Armed with those things, independence, strength, the ability to change, and the knowledge that I can always come home, leaving home has never been easy, but it's not been an earth shattering moment either.

I take my family with me, their love, their strength, their advice, the countless stories we have together. My family is in the steel of my spine, my ability to deal with life, my compassion and my shoulder to cry on.

At the end, I have my family. I have the best husband, Prince Charming in Combat Boots, who loves me, is strong when I can not, lets me hide from the world when I am scared, who makes me laugh when I need to, and lets me cry when I need to. And I have the most beautiful, smart, growing-like-a-weed, little girl, who is the center of my known world.

They're all the family I really need.