He's gone...

So, the boyfriend left this morning for his 6-month deployment. Around noon he started on a series of flights that will eventually land him in Iraq.

It was kind of weird this morning when we said goodbye. It was very similar to any other morning that he’d leave for work except the hug lasted a little longer, I had tears in my eyes and we both knew that instead of him coming back at the end of the day, he won’t be back until the end of the year.

I don’t know what I was expecting. Some long, drawn out proclamation of love? A promise of a blossoming future? I think we both knew we have to deal with the situation at hand and though those other thoughts and feelings have to be put on a back burner right now it doesn’t mean they don’t exist or aren’t important.

I’m really not handling it as well as I thought I would. I’ve been crying off and on since he left at 7:30 this morning. (Those that know me know that I’m EXTRA emotional.) I really want to be the strong girlfriend that knows this separation is only temporary and is confident her boyfriend will be back in December, unharmed. For some reason I just can’t be that person right now no matter how hard I try.

This weekend was spent packing, cleaning and just enjoying some down time. He even took me on a mini-tour of his job, showing me their training tools, different types of explosives and their equipment, like the robot they use to disarm bombs. Seeing some of that stuff gave me a better understanding of what he does and, I thought, calmed my fears a little. But all of that was forgotten this morning as he left my apartment.

But, I guess it may be too early to tell since this is only the first day. I can only hope that it gets easier and I can be the person he needs me to be.

Still, December 17 can’t get here fast enough.

He's leaving

We were eating stir fry I had made.
I was lying on my bed. He was sitting on the floor in front of the TV.
“Oh yeah, I found out where I’m going today.”
My boyfriend (Rico Ramon Don Juan aka Mark Storm…Ha! sorry folks, inside joke) is a Senior Airman in the U.S. Air Force. The first half of 2006 he was deployed to United Arab Emirites for six months and had been told he would be deployed again in June. He just didn’t know the location.
“Where?” I asked.
“Iraq.”

I was quiet while he kept eating and watching TV. I wondered what he was thinking, if he was worried at all about telling me and if he was scared.
I was.
There were different thoughts fighting for attention in my head – news footage from Baghdad, stories I had read, military funerals I had covered.

Neither of us said anything about it for awhile. Finally I said I didn’t want him to go and that I was going to kidnap him so that he couldn’t.
It was silly, I know, but I didn’t know what else to say about it. I was still processing what he told me. I mean, I’m still processing it three weeks later. There are questions and thoughts that are still works in progress that I can’t even piece together to write on this blog.

I was upset about it for the few days after I found out. Then my mom reminded me it’s not about me. It’s about him and what I can do for him before he leaves and when he gets back.

Suddenly I felt selfish. Of course I was worrying about his safety and his feelings about being deployed again. But I had also been wondering what I was going to do without him for 6 months, how lonely I was going to be and how much I will miss him. Thoughts of how pointless the war is also crossed my mind more than a few times… but I guess that’s neither here nor there…

So, I’ve been operating off of my mom’s advice. I don’t want him to worry about me worrying about him and I want him to know I’m here now and will be when he gets back in December.

These next couple of months before he leaves should be interesting…