It's Time

It's been a year. I know. For a writer to not write much of anything, nary a word, is sacrilege. Perhaps I will be forgiven if I account for my departure of the writing world. So we go back.

The Monster did come back, but not nearly as voracious as I thought it would. I found a doctor, close by, whom I am not exactly thrilled with, but supplies me with the meds that keep the pain at bay. He still doesn't actually believe that I have TN, but - hey - you can't have everything. A doctor that actually believes you AND prescribes the right meds? Puhlease.



Fortunately for my writing (and perhaps for my readers), this year will prove to be prolific in giving me plenty to vent, rant and rave about. Yes, the Army has wrapped it's long spidery arms around my husband again, and he is off to pay his dues in the sun and sand. Sounds lovely doesn't it? Sun, sand? Oh, to be truly a vacation. Not war. Not danger. Not....what it is.



And this time around (is it the fourth, fifth? I can't even keep it straight anymore) the deployment will bring new challenges as the kids are older, wiser and won't be placated with "Daddy's at work" anymore. They will know. Well, the older two will know. Not only because they are older and go to school with other Army kids with Dads and Moms "over there" but because we have seen far too many military funeral processions pass by our school, our grocery store, our church. They know to stop what they are doing and just be quiet. They know that for every white stone we pass on our travels across Post, lies a soldier who "went to work" and never came back.



Oh, how to get through it AGAIN? How to say good bye, turn to my children with a plastered-on smile and say, "Ok guys, let's have some fun." It worked the first three (four?) times....not sure it will work this time.



And so I will write. The ups, the downs, the in's the outs. And along the way...perhaps I will find a way to get through it -- again. For the fourth (fifth?) time.