Tag: family

Blessings for Thanksgiving and Time for a Hiatus

My apologies for skipping a check-in here for the month of October.

I let my favorite month get away from me and neglected to post. Instead, I spent a lot of time attending to my life outside this website. As the election drew near, I devoted my time to crafting the stories I wanted to share in my memoir. This long journey developing my first draft is still in progress; I like to imagine if I had a background in journalism, creative writing, communications, or English, my project would already be done by now. Instead, it has been an almost forgotten friendship that I visit–to stave off its death. My memoir has become an apology to my younger self for what I put her through and an exploration of the relationships that sustained me, harmed me, caused me to look to the future and ask myself what do you want to become and how are you going to get there and who is capable of traveling that journey with you.

This past month has been a pivot point as the individual stories are finally connecting to each other. I am grateful for my slow devotion because it is far too easy to give up and say it’s emotionally damaging to look back on my failures. There are a number of ways people showed up for me at the same time other people were barely putting any effort into the intersection of their lives with mine. When I look back at those difficult moments, I wish I had the courage to trust my first instincts. Things I felt didn’t line up the way the should and instead I gave some people a lot of grace given their past poor judgements and decisions. I opened myself up to needless hurt while they were running around destroying their own lives. Learning to see my 20-21 year old self and her struggles, I see she gave a number of people a blank slate to start their lives over and people punished her for the sins of women who came before her. I could have been a different person in some of the most difficult months of my life if I wasn’t holding space for people who treated me like a throwaway character in their own stories. I survived them, and it’s time I am honest about what it’s like to stop choosing to walk through chaos to heal hurt I never caused when I can choose shelter from storms I didn’t foster, peace of mind surrounded by like-minded spirits, and build a happy existence away from bitter souls.

This Thanksgiving I am leaning more into a life of peace and appreciating my blessings. The transition from 2023 to 2024 has been far from an easy one. Losing three family members was devastating. Finding time to sell one house and buy a new one heightened my personal stress as I also navigated moving from one work position to a temporary assignment to my current role. Developing yet another slew of health symptoms a source of frustration. My ongoing health challenges don’t yet have an official diagnosis and I will end 2024 in that same boat. Months of nerve pain and discomfort brought on by physical exertion is forcing me to slow down in ways I would not choose for myself. I would love to know what’s going on, but my new health care provider is having me go through a gamut of other lesser avenues of care and potential pain management through occupational therapy and physical therapy before seeing if we need to consult rheumatology. Right now, I am still waiting on answers for my last round of bloodwork, but the holidays are coming up and I am determined to enjoy my tradition of crafting something new for my family to enjoy.

Lamb is the on the menu for our entree and I decided I would like to add some American Indian/Indigenous persons touches to our holiday given the complex origins and ongoing celebration of Thanksgiving. I cannot really say why I hadn’t thought of it before. I haven’t unpacked whether I was concerned it would be culturally appropriate or whether I wasn’t sure I would be skilled enough to try out the recipes and/or able to find the ingredients. Rather than criticize myself for coming to this late realization it would be good for me as an American to try my hand at making this type of cuisine, I am hoping it encourages someone else to do the same. We’ll be using the New Mexico Magazine sumac Navajo leg of lamb with onion sauce recipe to craft our holiday entree although ours will use lamb shanks and lamb neck due to my lack of understanding I could ask my local butcher ahead of time to order a leg of lamb or a lamb roast, the other suggested cut within the recipe. In lieu of dinner rolls, we will make Navajo fry bread, a family favorite, although I made the mistake of not picking up powdered milk so I will adjust my plans and find a recipe that uses regular milk that I already have on hand. The milk I have is lactose free and this will be my first time frying with it, so I need to watch it in case it behaves differently like how it browns more quickly when baking with it.

Our main side dish is the enkum recipe below. I found this recipe a few months ago in The Cookbook in Support of the United Nations: For People and Planet I borrowed from a public library. In the past few years, I’ve come across a number of articles on making Thanksgiving dinner less beige (think white dinner rolls, gravy, turkey, stuffing) and boring. I love how this is a nutrient dense potato dish and the vibrant colors will make for a beautiful contrast to the lamb entree. I will still keep some “traditional” beige on the plate with the stuffing although this year I found a stuffing mix made from Hawaiian bread that caught my eye.

I have one thing that I absolutely love from my childhood and that’s Ocean Spray jellied cranberry sauce. I don’t care that it’s not healthy for me with all the added sugar and the fact it’s low fiber. I love it far too much to care that it’s lacking in nutritional value. While I will occasionally indulge in mine or someone else’s homemade cranberry sauce, if we are going for the stuff in the can, it better be Ocean Spray jellied cranberry sauce. The generic stuff won’t do–it’s not worth saving the $0.30 or $0.40 a can for this stuff.

And for one of the first years in awhile, I don’t have a dessert planned. Originally, I considered making a homemade ice cream with the frozen leftover crumbled chocolate chip pumpkin cookies a girlfriend made for us back in September, but I want a less busy holiday. We have some German Benton’s Spekulatius Cookies we picked up from Aldi’s recently or we could enjoy the Mexican assorted cookies we have in the pantry. There’s always a local family farm we could visit for fudge or pie if we want to venture out in the next few days, too.

Before I leave you all for this month, I do want to say I plan to have a bit of a hiatus to concentrate on my memoir. Whether I stick to said hiatus is another story. I love the fact I am finally past the 300 page mark for my memoir and I want to help see my first draft through completion before the end of 2024. This work has helped me to see the burdens I carried from my service and the blessing of people who want the best for me while I haven’t always worked towards that goal for myself. I’ve gotten to see myself in moments of deep pain and setting big dreams for the future. Next year will be the 20-year mark returning home from my first tour in Iraq and I think a bit fitting of a time to ideally see the draft come together as a finished project I want to market for publication. I cannot juggle that endeavor all that well if I have my regular 40-hour a week job and weeks of planning what to post on this blog. If I do check in, I think it might be a paragraph or two wishing you all well and I hope that’s enough.

I want to deliver this memoir to those who seek to understand our nation’s military better and what service members go through. I want this memoir to show young adults military service is always changing and to help people who have never served to see another facet of the Iraq war. This book is not meant for everyone, like any good story. It is an appreciation letter to a number of people who have worked to make my goal of serving come to fruition, to those who supported me through the unknowns of that first tour, for those who tolerated my anti-social behavior on tour number two, and the ones who met me along the finish line to ending my four year enlistment in the Marine Corps. I do want to see a second book come to light, too, to honor a number of passionate persons who helped get me diagnosed with PTSD and get the treatment I deserved, but it won’t come together as it needs to without book 1 happening first.

Wishing you and yours a lot of blessings this holiday season.

~Cheryl

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Decluttering the Past to Make Space for Future Adventures

My family and I recently completed a relaxing staycation in Phoenix and I loved that the rental home had several back copies of Real Simple magazine (along with several others publications like Dwell and Good Housekeeping). It is rare for me to buy magazines now because they are often so chock full of advertisements instead of useful content. This reality is why I will often pop onto the businesses’ websites instead to jump straight to the content I want to find. I selectively picked up this February 2020 copy, knowing that I had some decluttering I wanted to do in our current home.

This past year my heart has eagerly focused on wanting to move. I want to move up in my career. I want to move in the physical sense of exercising more, something that took a backseat due to health issues. I want to travel more and I accept staycations and out-of-state travel as options. We recently receiving our updated passports, too, so I expect we can start saving up for traveling out of country for an adventure next year or the year afterwards. My love for going to new places has been hampered by financial restrictions and also limited PTO (like most Americans). There are days my heart is jealous of persons living in European nations who can frequently hop on public transportation and move more easily from one nation to the next. Instead of sinking into that jealousy, I decided to do something proactive with my time.

My decluttering process also helps immensely with anxiety. Our home is just under 2,000 square feet and there are many days it feels like too much space to maintain. My body does not crave the micro apartments of New York City or Paris, but I would like something that feels more like a family home instead of a landing spot. My dad’s mom used to have a beautiful home on a lake in South Dakota. Some friends in Kentucky have a river that traverses part of their property. My dad’s home is located in a quiet neighborhood bordered by a little wooded area and there is a brewery hangout spot a short drive or a walk down the road in good weather. My younger sister lives in a home built in the 1960’s that has a layout I like a whole lot more than my complete open concept downstairs and her property is a short walk from a casual beach spot and a few restaurants. Their kids can stop in to get ice cream after playing in the water. I love that. We are getting some amenities like that where I live, but my mind still focuses on the house.

We bought in our current area for the local schools. After the pandemic hit and our daughter started schooling online, buying in this area was a decision I started to regret. It hasn’t entirely been a bad decision. I have a great relationship with my neighbor; I feel we are more like sisters than neighbors. A handful of restaurants that have gone in are great and the one that isn’t can easily be avoided. I cook better than their cooks do. The area is also very safe so we can go for walks, runs, and bike areas with very little concern for our safety. I still had to come to gripes with this box and the walls we live within. Our vacation rental provided a means to reassess the space we currently occupy. It can be years before I move out of state to somewhere like Kentucky, Indiana, or North Carolina (all still high on the list), but I can take the risk of selling sometime down the road and picking a new property that could be a better longtime investment due to growth in other communities.

I decided to play with my look at use a lot of different colors and patterns like Great British Bake Off baker, Kim-Joy. My daughter loved the look.

This closet in the vacation rental provided a lot of inspiration that it can be easy to build storage to house more than what we need to retain for practicality purposes and sentimental concerns. I should have measured the closet because it does have room for seasonal and in-season storage needs. I like that it is setup in the master suite so you don’t have to go find things in other household closets for these items. The residence was about 2,800 square feet, so I had the chance to live in a larger home to see what works or does not work at the footprint. I was most happy that each bedroom and the gathering areas has seating arrangements perfect for reading and that reality can be replicated in any home, regardless of its size.

Tackling what to downsize this time was a bit easier because I’ve been on this journey for years. Before we sold our first home in 2020, we had already donated hundreds of books, ill-fitting clothes and shoes, and tackled some excess papers. I still found we came into the new house with too much stuff! My obsession with journaling has gotten away from me over the years and with a clear mind, it was good to see most of those weren’t serving my needs. I tossed a middle school journal where I lamented my mother having a better relationship with my other siblings. I ripped apart a high school journal where I confronted, again, a boyfriend who was unfaithful for our entire relationship. (He has grown into a better man and apologized. He is still married to the woman he cheated on me with, so there’s no repairing the friendship though. She and I aren’t going to be friends. The apology is enough.) A travel journal about my high school trip to Cape Verde was hardly anything more than discussing being an outsider among my American school peers. The best reminders of the trip are showcased in some loving photos I still keep to this day. 2024 was a repeat of paperwork reduction.

Paperwork and photos are my kryptonite.

I try not be overwhelmed and saddened by events I experienced, some things I put myself through, and people that I’ve lost.

Here’s what I parted ways with in 2024:

  • Old Marine Corps cartoons I drew (keeping only two and a realistic pen drawing of Marines sleeping in MOPP)
  • High School report cards and official transcripts (3.75 GPA doesn’t matter when you have two grad degrees)
  • Marine Corps training certificates from Technical Escort school (I am not in the CBRN community anymore)
  • Photo duplicates and bad quality photos
  • Condolence cards after my mother’s death (I did keep one because my teacher wrote a lot of heartfelt messages)
  • Old cards from my Grandmother with basic greetings (I did keep meaningful letters she wrote)
  • Letters from one of my high school best friends (We are no longer friends and stopped talking about 2006)
  • Old VA decision letters (after carefully shredding them because they contain PII)
  • Board games we don’t play or don’t play often enough
  • Books donated to the public library (Mine included There’s No Such Thing as An Easy Job, How to Pronounce Knife, Stiff, etc.)

I am trying to find a balance between Marie Kondo’s “Does is spark joy?” and the reality that some of my possessions are practical even if they don’t always bring me joy. I don’t follow a modern minimalism approach as I feel some of those houses come off real cold, but too much stuff makes me feel like I have too much to maintain and I lose track of what I already possess.

Staying in that rental where possessions can be spread out and breath a bit more was more helpful than I expected. I could see my hobbies haven’t changed all that much since my early 20’s. I grew to love cooking after separating from the Marine Corps. A family and friends centric kitchen and dining area will always be important to me. My mom worked hard to get me to love reading and that grounding activity still matters to me. Sure, I don’t need a library that rivals the one in “Beauty and the Beast.” Right now, I have a few on display and because a move is financially possible this year, some other favorites are tucked away, including Anna Kendrick’s Scrappy Little Nobody, DIY MFA, and Lauren Graham’s Talking As Fast as I Can: Gilmore Girls to Gilmore Girls (and Everything in Between). I am actually eager for Kelly Bishop’s The Third Gilmore Girl to be released later this year to add it to my collection.

Paring down photos is still an ongoing journey. I haven’t completely pared down my Marine Corps collection, but last year we finally tossed our Marine Corps recruit training yearbooks. They weren’t doing anything fabulous in our lives (and I’m hardly photographed plus mine look awful). I also destroyed the bulk of our excess Marine Corps camouflage uniforms last year too by rendering them unserviceable before they went into the trash. Our daughter is starting to be more interested in our Marine Corps careers, so I selectively set aside some photos not in albums. I figured this way she can easily find them when she wants to look at them and if not this weekend, maybe next weekend I will write down where I was at in them.

Me in 2003 (left) left photo and on the far right (right photo) at Marine Corps Combat Training (East Coast)
Me (center) with two sailors I met while attending Command and Control Personal Computers (C2PC) at Naval Base Coronado in 2004. My coworker, Balsam, is on the far left (seated). We worked together stateside and on my first tour in Iraq, although on different shifts.
These are two of my favorite photos from Al Asad Air Base, Iraq (July 2006)

Clearing out some physical space in my life and more mental clarity is what my April needed. As a short snippet, I was reading through old journal entries sent to my family members and their letters to me. Revisiting these sentiments was a real strong clue that the Marine Corps needed to revamp how it treats service members in need of medical care and I should have trusted my instincts more. Decluttering can be calming although it does often bring trauma up to the surface.

Right now, we are in the process of adding a new fur baby to the family. My husband’s service dog will retire sometime this year and this new bundle of fluff will have a lot of hands-on training with the family to step into his role. In anticipating her arrival, I cleared out all the old veterinary invoices for our dog, Gregor, and the ones for our guy, Radar, who passed in 2022. Removing the vet bills was one of the hardest things to tackle this year. Our time with Gregor is limited based on his age and Radar’s death resulted from a swift decline in his health. I don’t have the heart right now to part ways with the journal entry I wrote for Radar just before his passing or the obituary I wrote after he passed.

My journey is a reminder it’s ok to keep even some sad memories. And it’s more important to talk about those experiences. We’re not meant to pent up all our pain. But when the right time comes, we can release it.

Shred useless papers. Burn or toss the photos that need to go. Write and edit your reflections.

Talk about it with your friends, family, and strangers (depending on your comfort level).

Declutter and regain your power to breath life into your dreams.

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2023 Holidays & Looking Ahead to 2024

Being a few days ahead of Christmas, I wanted to catch up with you all before things get too busy and I completely forget to post for the month of December. I’ve spent a few weeks trying to decide what to share. This year has been a pretty big one for my family, both immediate and extended. For the first time, my family took a weeklong vacation; let me focus on that for a second. FOR.THE.FIRST.TIME. In a country where we both have paid leave time, it’s felt almost impossible to make this happen over the past few years. It’s not that we haven’t traveled, but we haven’t managed a trip that lasted seven calendar days. Not everyone would want their first weeklong vacation to be in Kentucky; they might choose Hawaii, somewhere in the Caribbean, or spend all those days ensconced in the glory of Disneyworld. I wasn’t saddened for our first long trip 1) wasn’t somewhere warm, 2)was away from the ocean, and 3) kept us stateside. We caught up with a Marine friend of ours and his family and it felt like going home. The hardest part of the trip was not being prepared for the sudden, first cold spell of the year. Once again, we did not bring enough cold weather clothes. Moving on…

As it goes for my extended family and our family relations, we lost two members on my mother’s side of the family. An aunt by marriage and a biological uncle passed away. Both were sudden news to my siblings and I. I guess part of that all comes with age; we all have our own routines and some of us live out-of-state, but there’s also the part of me that sees these deaths dug up a lot of buried feelings. We felt like we were reliving our mother’s loss because she didn’t want us to know she was dying and we had similar circumstances for these two loved ones. It takes a moment to shirk off the feeling that you do not feel a part of the familial group because you were left in the dark. I see us recovering, and I know we’re not alone in experiencing grief this year. Many in my family joked about how someone else would have to take up my uncle’s habit of eating all the deviled eggs at Thanksgiving and I know my Facebook has looked a lot different this year without seeing the positive posts my Aunt would share to bring joy to our small world. The last time I was back home was in 2019 and I don’t know when we’ll be back for the holidays there, so it will take a moment to soak in how different life is once we are all under one roof again.

Being in our small trio here (plus the dog), Christmas preparations were pared back this year. In part, we’ve still considered the possibility of moving and on the other hand, it was nice to just have less work on our hands. Our vacation checked the box for rest and relaxation needs and I like having that feeling extended further into the year. We bought a few little things from Trader Joe’s: a tabletop Christmas tree, live green garland, mistletoe, cedar scented balsam pinecones (which I put into empty vases and oversized candle holders) and a door arrangement to replace the bell ornament wreath we normally put out front. This year, we put the latter up over our dog’s oversized dog door; he might not appreciate it, but I love seeing it when we come home from errands or a night out. From our decor collection already on hand, I set out only a few things. I want to mention specifically my two origami cranes (gifts from a friend in Cody, WY and they honor the experiences of Japanese Americans who lived in internment camps in the United States during WWII). I never visited the Heart Mountain Relocation Center, but her small gift still resonates with me today. I’ve had these about 11 years now and I do think it would be worth it to get them professionally mounted so I can leave them out year round rather than just as a sign of peace and goodwill at Christmas. From our ornament collection, I only pulled out the Hallmark snowman my husband’s grandmother has purchased for us over the years. Sadly, we’ve had a few ornaments go MIA so not all years are represented. Lastly, I put out a few plaid Christmas trees from Target (which are on our last year with us) and a metal string light desktop tree (another Target find). I stopped myself from buying some cute wooden ornaments from Target, knowing that to do so was self-defeating if my goal was to keep our prep and takedown simple this year. And speaking of simple, we aren’t the type of family that goes nuts playing Christmas music and watching every Christmas movie under the sun.

There are very few Christmas songs that I like; I know that makes me sound like a Grinch, but all those traditional songs I listened to in the ’90’s are why. If I want something that speaks more of traditional Christmas sounds, I will gravitate to Frank Sinatra. When we lived in California, there was a coffee shop next to the movie theater in Oceanside that would play his music around the holidays and I love those memories. These are the songs I have on my Apple Music playlist:

  • One More Sleep (Leona Lewis)
  • Homesick (Dua Lipa)
  • Yule Shoot Your Eye Out (Fall Out Boy)
  • Present Without a Bow (Kacey Musgraves)
  • Coming Home to You (American Authors)
  • Snow (Alex G.)
  • The Christmas Song (Shawn Mendes and Camila Cabello)
  • Christmas Tree Farm (Taylor Swift)
  • Christmas Saves The Year (twenty one pilots)
  • Cozy Little Christmas (Katy Perry)
  • Last Christmas (Ariana Grande)

For Christmas movies, there are only a few I’ve truly enjoyed. I want to start off by saying my husband is the reason I’ve seen National Lampoon’s Christmas Vacation. I don’t know that I would have chosen that for myself, but I did enjoy it. There are three others that I can watch each year. The one that has been my favorite for years is The Family Stone (2005). I think a big part of my love affair with the movie is that it was the first year I was home from Iraq and after that difficult year, it was the type of lighthearted comedy my life needed at the time. I am sucker for romantic comedies anyways, but this is high up there on my list of favorite comedies. Next, I adore Noelle (2019) starring Anna Kendrick. It doesn’t matter what she’s in, I will watch it. She is one of my favorite female comedic actresses, but her range of skills surprised me when I saw her in A Simple Favor (2018). If you want a little bit of a tearjerker moment for your holidays, I’d recommend Last Christmas (2019) starring Emilia Clarke. There is enough humor in the film to offset the sad moments, but it is a wonderful representation that Christmas (and other holidays) can be a mixed blessing. I am still stunned to this day that Ms. Clarke has sustained two brain aneurysms in her life and if you are still looking for a charity to support, please check out her charity, SameYou, which helps support rehabilitation options for brain injury survivors.

As we look towards 2024, I have a few things to say about closing out 2023. We won’t know where the next year will take us, but for now, we know we’re not moving in 2023. This little meme about the housing market gave me a good chuckle about having to put some plans on hold. After our Louisville, KY trip, I’ve become addicted to Zillow again and scouted houses in Louisville; outside Ft. Knox, KY, and since Indiana was big on our list, I also looked at homes in New Albany, Jeffersonville, Clarksville, Floyds Knobs, and Corydon. As alternatives, for other federal jobs on our radar, we looked at homes in northern Indiana to put us close enough to Chicago without living in Chicago; parts of Maryland; parts of Hawaii; and parts of Virginia. I have a few federal job referrals locally here in Arizona, so we might just be calling this place home a bit longer.

Trying to feel more “at home” for the holidays, I have caved and done a little holiday baking. There was a three-day whiskey gingerbread recipe from Ruby Tandoh’s Eat Up! book that I made for our neighbor and ourselves. Since our daughter is 13, I opted to use orange juice in the glaze over whiskey but next time we’ll make one completely with whiskey brushed on it and the glaze and see how we all feel. I will also use less liquid in the glaze so it sets better. Most of the glaze ran off the cake and make an orange icing puddle instead.

And there is one last thing I wanted to focus on today. This is my last year in my 30’s!!! If I had stayed in the Marine Corps, this would have also been the year I retired from military service. My life is so different now from what I envisioned it would be. I still have so much I want to accomplish, but I am also grateful that I feel more settled now, too. My 20’s were such a busy time trying to power through college and raising a young child and now there is breathing room. It might not feel like it every day, but I like that I can call it a day at the end of my work shift and there’s not a mountain of other responsibilities waiting to greet me. At this time, I am still powering through the first draft of my memoir. This thing might not be released until I’m 50, but I guess late is better than never. It’s taken a lot of courage to put pen to paper and write down some lovely moments, those cringeworthy incidents, and to own up to being a shitty human being at times. I don’t have it all figured out, but at least when you get older, you feel better about saying so. In your teens and 20’s, it’s tempting to try to fit in and compete with everyone, but once you sit back and see how others are living, you see their journey isn’t your journey. Their wants and needs aren’t your dreams and basic necessities. I am sitting at around page 245 and that’s a far cry from my 2016 start of 3 pages that I later tossed because that story was one I didn’t want to tell. I want to show I survived a lot of crap in a short period of time, and it’s the people that showed up for me that helped me become the woman I became today.

Wishing you all gentle holidays. I say this because I read from someone before it’s better to wish a gentle holiday because we don’t know what others are going through. Their holidays may not be happy this year as they encounter financial hardship, their first holiday without a loved one, or they have other things going on that don’t make them feel jolly this season.

~Cheryl

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A Year of Health, Happiness, and Feeling Like ‘Home’ Is Less of an Abstract Concept

Thanksgiving 2023 is TOMORROW. Families or friends will gather to give thanks for all that they have. As someone who has struggled with being told to express gratitude, this holiday is one of the hardest for me. I AM grateful for all that I have; I just know for all the work I’ve put into certain endeavors my expectation for the final results has not always aligned with what came to fruition. Some years that progress is easier to greet. The more that I’ve seen social media explode into a world of influencers (with a lot less education might I add) flaunting monthly income figures easily topping $20,000 or more, the more disheartened I am that I committed to earning four college degrees and my take home seems paltry. My post-graduate career path has felt like I am on a crumbled asphalt road leading at points to a dirt path to a dying town no one wants to see survive. It’s like if you’re unwilling to hawk every product known to man to make a buck there is no (or little) space for you in this employment minefield. This situation has recently led to me popping onto social media for fixed amounts of time and to start culling my list of accounts I follow. I’m tired of everyone gushing over every car brand, type of wheat flour, fashion trend, or makeup product and their #ad posts reminds me that as much as I’ve cut back on retail therapy in my in-person life, there is always someone itching to sell a product online their own pockets. 2023 is a year I’ve worked to re-establish peace in my life.

This situation has not been easy to tackle. We are still witnessing the Hamas-Israel war continue to unfold; if things continue as they are, the Russia-Ukraine war will also hit another anniversary in February; this year, it took some time to watch my health turn around; and we’re all around the globe continuing to see unrealistic housing prices and grocery costs make it harder to get by. Reclaiming some semblance of control with what is and what is possible takes an honest look at the circumstances of the past, present, and desired future. As a war veteran, I am not near the landscape of either of these wars, so I am, like so many, an important witness instead of an active participant in the fighting. I have a responsibility to build my education about what is happening and to encourage the resolution of these wars. My heart has an unlimited capacity to care for the non-combatants whose lives have been turned upside down by these events. When I see their strife, I know that my chronic health struggles of this year pale in comparison. Not that it means I should not attend to my medical needs, but I can keep my complaints in check. I still live in a world where I can regularly access fresh safe drinking water, enough food to support my needs, and medical care to help reduce the severity of my symptoms and encourage the prevention of longterm health problems. This year, with the world being what it is, I have tried to enjoy the natural beauty around us more.

We started our year in California, having ended 2022 in a short vacation there. Our stay in Rancho Palos Verdes gave us a respite place to land after a difficult year where we lost our dog, Radar, to an unexplained illness. He struggled from the moment we brought him home with chronic skin infections and towards the end of his life all the veterinary care we could afford did not result in diagnosing a treatable condition. Starting and ending our day by the ocean helped me to appreciate the fact the world is vast and will always be larger than our existence as human beings. Every day, the ocean starts a cycle anew and is transformed by the heat of the sun, cloud cover, the wind, and the moment of animals. She is never the same, and I think I’ve had to learn to accept that about myself, too, instead of mourning the ways my career has not gone.

While I take a moment to breathe about where my career has not gone, I am fortunate that friends remind me of what has been. One of my Marine friends from my time with 1st Marine Division sent me this photo of our shop located at Camp Pendleton 33 Area. When I joined, it was the NBC platoon shop until our career path was re-fashioned as “Chemical Biological Radiological and Nuclear Defense.” Sandwiched alongside Combat Camera, I lived in a world that I was never quite sure I belonged in, but I was smart enough to squeak by and join. That imposter syndrome people talk about, I get it. There was so much educational material thrown at us during our MOS school that I no longer remember. Once I stopped using this information my brain was absolutely ready to dump it. I guess that’s why I never feel it necessary to tell people about what I did in the Marine Corps for my MOS. The work I did in Iraq for 1st Marine Division was outside the MOS and has remained a more honest reflection of my skills. I have a lot of administrative skill as it relates to records and seeing how different pieces of puzzles fit together. Could I run a gas chamber today, if permitted? Probably. I wouldn’t enjoy leading service members now through the steps of donning and clearing their masks and having them go through certain exercises in the gas chamber any more than I did in the service. But put me back into the command aspect of operations and I’ve found myself a home. It’s a different way of seeing people, society, the elements of risks and safety and I kind of shine there.

In trying to find where I belong, I also have to confront what is not meant for me. (Isn’t that one of the hardest things to accept?!). Earlier this year, we started to explore moving to a different part of the Phoenix Valley. Our current home has appreciated in value quite well due to the pandemic housing uptick and the modifications we’ve made to it since occupying the house. We educated ourselves about listing offerings through Zillow and ones curated from a custom listing search with our realtor. A 1950’s home was high on our interest list but we were never able to visit it since the family handling the estate didn’t respond in time to our request for a showing. We saw large properties (think 13,000 square feet…which is good for us here), but both of those older homes were less appealing on the inside due to lack of proper came from the homeowners. Nothing dire, but there would be some serious elbow grease involved and a questioning as to when things like the roof, water heater, and HVAC might be in need of replacing. One of my favorites, although it had a quirky layout, was a home in Tempe, Arizona. This is the front door to that place. It is more a patio home. We could have lived with the quirky layout, but it had an incredibly low fence, about 4-5 ft high. The lack of privacy and risk our dog (or future dog) would get out made it a no go.

This is where that journey of what’s not meant for you can lead into something that might be a better fit. We settled into the fact we weren’t uprooting our existing lifestyle (although we prepared and packed a bunch of boxes that are still packed up) and busied ourselves this summer with work until we could take our fall vacation. Going to Louisville, KY this year with a brief stay in Nashville, TN opened us up to a possibility we didn’t know existed. Our Marine Corps friend, who we were visiting to see him and his family, told us the state of Indiana offers a tuition and fee exemption for children of service-connected veterans. We’d have to live in Indiana for at least 5 years before our daughter is eligible, but it’s still worth exploring. Over the past few weeks, my husband and I have started to look at career and home prospects in the Indiana area. Knowing that it wouldn’t be good to just look at this one opportunity, we’ve both applied to different federal jobs: some are remote, one is in Kentucky, another is in Chicago, and we have covered our bases in the Virginia/Washington D.C. area. If we want more pay but aren’t in a position to settle in Indiana, we won’t have a tuition exemption for our daughter in the other locales. My preference would be for us to both move into higher paying remote jobs and find our next home in Indiana, allowing us to tick as many boxes of “financial life hacking” as possible. Plus it never hurts to live closer to people you love and trust. Our vacation visiting these friends was one of my happiest memories this year. I felt at home in Louisville and that doesn’t really happen when I visit somewhere new.

This sense of “home” is something I know is unique to all of us. I recognize some people are grateful they live in large cities with a plethora of amenities while others crave rural roads and lots of open space. Arizona as “home” has been something I’ve questioned a lot over the years. We had a real rocky start our first few years, but there are things that I also enjoy tremendously outside of living near some good friends (and family a few hours away). Seeing plants bloom in the desert is almost a spiritual experience. The area comes alive with color for a brief moment of time and the fragrant scent of some plants, especially after it has rained, has a calming effect. We don’t get a lot of rain, so it’s something I always look forward to here and I love when the sky darkens as monsoon rains are almost ready to cascade down on us. I also enjoy the smell of jet fuel when we visit ASU’s Polytechnic campus. Not the best thing to breathe in, but it is a reminder of passing diesel fueling stations at Al Asad Air Base and it’s a weird comfort thing for me. Will it feel weird one day to say goodbye to this place? Sure, but starting over somewhere new can be exhilarating. There are possibilities like owning more land, seeing more fall foliage, enjoying a smattering of new restaurants and cuisines not as easily found where we live now, and making the eastern half of the United States (and Canada) more feasible to visit.

Taking the time like this to write down about my year makes it easier to see that a lot has gone well, even if not all is right with the world. Tomorrow, we will keep our festivities simple. We ordered Hawaiian food from Highway Inn through Goldbelly. For dessert, I am making cookie dough dip from Blackberry Babe and we’re pairing it with Goya brand chocolate Maria cookies. A holiday cocktail is on the menu as well and for this year, I’ve chosen Liquor’s Expense of Honesty, which will require modifications based on the type of alcohol we have on hand. There is no way I’m visiting Total Wine the day before Thanksgiving!!! If our dog lets us, we’ll sleep in. The day with start with a leisurely walk and a morning coffee (black, no sugar or cream). We are not hosting anyone or going out anywhere. In this year where we’ve traveled more, there is no disappointment on my end to enjoy a quiet holiday at home. I will revel in fact we have a roof over our head, enough food, our health and happiness needs met, and a future that is ours to carve out differently than we previously imagined it would take shape.

Wishing you and yours the very best until we touch base again.

~Cheryl

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Anxiety Self-Care and Vacationing

I took a trip to Wyoming recently with my family to visit Sheridan and Gillette and as rewarding as vacations are, I am always happy to get back home.

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Flying back into Phoenix-Mesa Gateway Airport

Home means stability for me and it helps me greatly in managing anxiety.  I don’t over schedule myself when I am at home the way I do on vacation.

This vacation, in particular, was a bit more full than I expected.  I had dreams of lounging around a bit more but now that my daughter is 7 years old, she wants to, naturally, do more.  She wants to explore and visit, and being a young child, she is demanding, hates naps, and will squeeze every ounce of daylight when not impeded by her mother.  Unlike when we lived in Wyoming, she is also old enough now to have a fully fledged opinion.  She was “meeting” people for the first time because she didn’t remember them from years ago and she also was insistent on having as much time with her young cousins as possible.  As an only child, she craves time with other children and summertime is the worst time of year for her.  She is not around her school friends and with high temps here, we spend more time indoors.

My daughter does not yet comprehend the stress I carry on a daily basis.  She knows I don’t like fireworks but she hasn’t caught on how a significant change of routine bothers me.  I look forward to vacations but I also struggle with leaving my comfortable environment.  I worry about what could happen when I leave my home, both to my home and the people in it while we are away.  There’s a lot of history recorded in my journals, photo albums, and scrapbooks that I can lose if something happens.  Additionally, I don’t like the idea of someone’s possessions becoming personal effects, to include mine should something terrible happen while we are away.  I considered writing about these feelings when I took my trip to Albuquerque last year but was quite hesitant to do so; while I am beginning to feel more comfortable talking about my personal struggles and coping, I still tread lightly.

I’m not surprised by my sensitivity to people and possessions, but I’ve had 12 years to wrap my mind around the intense situation that was my first deployment.  After spending 12 hours of nearly every day on deployment knowing people died and others were wounded, I became more aware we don’t all get a fair shake at living (and living the way we choose).  Without knowing the true number of people who died on my deployment, it’s still safe to say I have few peers who will ever understand the human toll of a deployment like I do.  (For any newbies, my alternative view of Operation Iraqi Freedom, as incomplete as it is, is available for viewing here. If you check out the video, please also read the blog entry for clarity purposes.  Thanks. )

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Some of my most precious possessions

For me, this vacation was a beautiful experience and one of the true breaks we’ve taken this summer as we had quite an unexpected–but necessary–financial burden demanding our immediate attention.  My husband’s service dog tore her ACL in June but was (and is) recovering from surgery and was unable to walk more than five minutes shortly before we left for vacation.  Her recovery will still take months but she is starting to show tremendous progress and is happy again, instead of her morose state when we couldn’t let her do any activity except use the bathroom.  If she had been able to walk, she would have flown with us for the first time and yes, there was some anxiety about that issue as well.  As you can see, she’s not a petite girl and even with my husband, daughter, and I all in the same row, she would attract attention.  I have no doubt other passengers would have inquired about her and peppered my husband with questions.

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That happy kid look after surgery was too precious.

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She became quite leery we’d take all the fun out of her day with her surgery recovery restrictions.

I’ve made great strides to significantly reduce my chest pains this year through regular self-care, but I had four of them during the course of this trip.  The additional stress of monitoring my husband because he didn’t have his service dog was a contributing factor. While I can recognize times where my husband needs additional support I notice it much later than she can and I didn’t feel quite as prepared to be his “service person”–yes, that’s what we joked I was doing in my caregiver capacity–because she had to stay behind.  Other things, like not being consistent about my sleep routine, contribute to the frequency of my chest pains.  Normally, I like to be in bed no later than 10pm and  I think most nights we were lucky to be back at our hotel room by 10:30 or 11pm.  Different noises also present challenges when it comes to sleep as I have trouble drowning them out; my bedroom at home, by comparison, is kept very quiet.  I do not have a wall clock and after living in my home for a year, I am used to the sound of the house fan when it’s on during hot evenings.  I am also a big fan of blackout curtains; the darker the room, the easier it is for me to stay asleep.  There are other things I can do like moderating my consumption of coffee and alcohol that also help reduce the frequency of my chest pains.  (I know I drank far too much coffee on this vacation, nearly 3-4 cups a day, but I was pretty good about keeping my alcohol consumption in check.)

In spite of my continuing battle with anxiety induced chest pains, the vacation was successful.  I think one of the things we need to keep at the forefront of conversation about anxiety and coping is resiliency.  I’ve had these annoying things for 12 years–and it’s really only in the last few that good medical professionals have worked with me to control this condition so it doesn’t destroy my quality of life.  Occasionally, they have to remind me not to pass up opportunities because I know they may or will exacerbate the stress I already have in my life. They also remind me I’ve been through the worst so the things that bother me are triggers (fireworks, sudden loud noises, people walking behind me surpising me suddently, etc.) and not actually life threatening events.   The fact that I had four chest pains on this trip is a sign I do need to plan better for my vacations.  I am still learning to say ‘no’ and I think because I’m in my 30’s I still feel silly to say I go to bed so early and in many cases, need the additional sleep.  Not everyone understands this issue and unlike my peer group, I find it harder to forgo time with family and do not wish to come across as being rude.  Next time, I’ll also work on cutting back on coffee.  I’m sure it’s not bad to have a day or two with that much coffee but the others I should probably stick to two or less cups.

I’m only taking you on a partial journey of the trip but below are some of the wonderful things I photographed during my weeklong visit.  If you want to see more things from the trip, feel free to check out my Instagram, she_wears_dogtags.

Like always, thanks for stopping in to visit.

~Cheryl

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The view behind our hotel room

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One of the flowers in my husband’s grandmother’s garden

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My grandmother-in-law has this sign from her late husband’s job working for telephone companies.

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My readers know suicide prevention is important to me and I love how this sign is integrated into community spaces.   

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I got to see inside a home built in 1905 and it had all this gorgeous mahogany on the walls and stairs. 

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I enjoyed sharing a flight of beers at Black Tooth Brewing Company. (I also learned IPA’s are not my thing.)

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My beer of choice at Black Tooth Brewing Company is the seasonal blonde ale.

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I’m a sucker for architecture and I’m glad my husband took me to the old post office in Sheridan to check out the marble staircase.

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I didn’t get donuts from this little place only because it wasn’t open when we walked by.

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This JC Penney’s is where I got clothes after returning stateside from deployment #2 as the only civilian clothes I had were the ones I was wearing.  It was surprising to see the store is closing.

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Clearmont, Wyoming

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The potato oles were one of my favorite foods when we lived in Cody, WY and they are still as good.  I just eat less of them now.

 

 

 

 

 

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Turning 33

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My Mini Me and I Out at Dinner Tonight

Good evening, everyone.

My entry will be quite short.  I am currently in the middle of crafting a post about recently going back through the disability claims process with the Department of Veterans Affairs but it is appropriate to take a break to share that today is my 33rd birthday.

I am very blessed to make it to 33 years of age.  I came home from Iraq the first time on my 21st birthday and my birthday has taken on a different meaning since that important transition.

Like my 2005 birthday, I did indulge in some alcohol.  Back then it was beer and cranberry vodka shots (Not a good idea…I repeat a horrible freaking idea…don’t repeat my mistake…seriously, do not make this mistake…you’ll puke a lot) and tonight I enjoyed a new Chardonnay at one of my favorite places, Bar Vinedo.  I made the adult decision to stop at reasonable point, made easier by the fact I’m completing the Fighter Diet and have a horrible ability to tolerate alcohol right now.

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I like to keep my birthday festivities to quiet small gatherings.  My daughter changed my plans further today when she asked (last night to her dad) about hanging out with me for the day in lieu of attending school.  How do I say no to such a cute request?! I threw out plans I had today to enjoy being a hermit while she and my husband were in school, completing my lower body workout and cardio routine, reading from Mind Over Money: The Psychology of Money and How to Use It Better, and taking a nap.  Yes, I had great ambitions as an adult for birthday indulgences!!!

I still kept to my Fighter Diet workout routine, mostly because I wanted to not feel guilty about indulging for dinner (dessert was not planned at all!).  I like working out.  Do I always want to work out? No.  However, it is great seeing the progress I’ve made and I know I’ll continue to make progress with mostly healthy eating habits and sticking to a solid workout routine.

Instead of hanging out with my fellow Marines in the barracks drinking horrible drink concoctions, my husband, daughter and I went out to dinner after I spent the day in my daughter’s company doing kid friendly things (splitting lunch and a cookies and cream monsoon, hanging out at the playground, and completing homemade craft projects).

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Cookies and cream monsoon with coffee from the Agritopia Coffee Shop.

I am very grateful I took today off from work.  My birthday is one of those days I quite enjoy a quiet respite from my typical hectic pace.  This year, I enjoyed it even more since I stayed up late watching an few episodes of Gilmore Girls with my family and additionally, my daughter camped out on the couch with me depriving me of a full night’s sleep.

My day ended with a fabulous grilled cheese and prosciutto sandwich, some of my favorite french fries, and this delicious dessert which I’ve been hesitant to order before because it has banana ice cream. Chocolate Mousse+pecan crust+chocolate ganache+ brûlée banana ice cream covered in salted caramel + chocolate drizzle on the side=How did I not order this item earlier? (Yes, my fear that it would be too banana flavored.)

Good night, everyone.  I hope your day turned out as well as mine and when your birthday rolls around, it’s just as wonderful.  I owe many thanks to everyone who loves me and wished me a happy birthday in text message, Facebook posts, voice mails, emails,and so on.

I have a great support system.

~Cheryl

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Pecan Chocolate Torte ($7)….It’s better than birthday cake.

 

 

 

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2007 Versus 2017: Goals, Goals, Goals

Hello, everyone.  I know New Year’s treated you well.  I spent my three-day weekend at home and enjoyed a slight decrease (much to my appreciation) in fireworks exposure.  My new neighbors don’t seem to go quite as crazy as the ones I had in the Willows neighborhood in Gilbert.  If you like fireworks, you might enjoy a stroll through this neighborhood on the 4th of July or New Year’s Eve; I anticipate in a neighborhood of 586 houses so long as the Town of Gilbert permits fireworks, people will set up small fireworks shows just outside their front doors.  For today though, I’ll like to start my first 2007 versus 2017 post.

2007 was important for me because I completed my active duty service with the Marine Corps and started to explore what life beyond the Corps would look and feel like, my taste of adult freedom if you will.  I won’t say I made smart money moves back then so as we begin this new journey looking back and discussing my future in 2017, please know I will likely discuss money a lot.  My financial needs were met very well on active duty; my husband and I did not have any kids while I was serving and we both collected a housing allowance.  Since we both served, we received one full housing allowance and the other received a partial housing allowance.  I do apologize that I do not recall the actual monetary amounts because I understand this knowledge aids our conversation greatly.  All too often, a young service member will complain about not having sufficient pay for food, housing, etc.  but for our household size and relative expenses, we always came out ahead even after I separated until we moved to Wyoming in 2009.  Stories for another day I know, but the short version is that many of our expenses, fixed and variable, remained the same and our housing allowance decreased significantly.

In 2007, I had some lofty wedding reception ambitions.  While we never ended up having our wedding reception the reality is I spent a significant amount of time planning for a costly one-day event.  On the skinny spending side, I think we were looking at $8,000 to $10,000 for the venue, a photographer, hotel rooms, travel, food, etc.  The dream was dropped before anything was booked but not until after I purchased my wedding gown (we got married through the Justice of the Peace in 2006) and picked up some small wedding related items.

My desire to control my personal finances did not truly begin until we moved to Wyoming. Our crash course in the broke life lead us to Dave Ramsey’s Financial Peace University.  Being introduced to Dave Ramsey’s program through friends and their church, we made headway towards undoing the financial damage.  It’s not fun, but without the substantial housing allowance we received in California, we had to take a serious look at our finances. Throughout the years, we’ve still struggled to stay on the Dave Ramsey path so I still refer back to the books and resources.  My in-laws also added more Dave Ramsey resources to our collection.  Additionally, I kept my Financial Planning notebook from my undergraduate studies because I want to ensure I update our financial goals (i.e. retirement planning, life insurance planning, etc.) as our family needs change over time.

With my husband still in school, 2017 does not wear the carefree face our lives did in 2007.  We just don’t have that same amount of money to play with on a daily basis.  Thankfully, he has one semester of Post-9/11 GI Bill® benefits to help cover expenses this semester but law school is one of those endeavors where we are bringing student loan debt into our lives.  This decision obviously strays from Dave Ramsey’s teachings.  We take steps towards self-improvement and I would prefer to not be shamed for student loan debt; I do not make enough money to fully fund law school.  We considered ASU’s Employee Reduced Tuition but the reality is 100% of that tuition reduction is taxed for graduate programs and I am already working on a tight single income, the last thing I need is more money taken out of my paycheck at this time.  Now that we have a more transparent conversation (thanks for not judging me or keeping your opinion to yourself) I would like to share personal goals for the year.

My goals are broadly categorized under personal achievements, family activities, and home improvement.  Financial planning is important to each one of these endeavors.  I am in a place to either spend money for the results or I am saving money to complete the goal.    Although I am not outlining these as SMART (specific, measurable, action-oriented, realistic, and time-based) for your respective purposes as the reader, these qualities are important whenever you desire to see a goal through completion and I’m keeping these factors in mind for each goal.

In lieu of resolutions, here are my planning goals for 2017:

  1. Finish Pauline Nordine’s Butt Bible Challenge to restore fitness discipline into my life (Challenge runs January to March).
  2. Attend an adoption education event, free other than cost to get there.
  3. Add $1,000 to my daughter’s savings before the close of 2017.
  4. Pay for a one recipient’s scholarship for the Rising Stars, Desert Nights Writing Conference.
  5. Close a credit card account.
  6. Finish painting my master’s bathroom (February).
  7. Complete a family vacation (no visiting extending family).
  8. Attend a family member’s wedding.
  9. Add additional money to our emergency fund (i.e. amount will vary depending on overtime worked and additional income received this year).
  10. Finish first draft of memoir by October.
  11. Set up college fund accounts for nieces and my nephew to be born this year in lieu of gifts and clothes for Christmas.
  12. Visit family who have not seen my daughter since 2011.
  13. Set aside money for an adoption home study (approximately $1,200 to $1,800) before the end of the year. (Goal is to adopt in 2019)
  14. Replace our large bookcase with wall shelves (May/June).
  15. Purchase (1) PAX wardrobe for master bedroom (September/October).
  16. Put in Astroturf and extend patio slab (March/April).
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Writing About Your Life: Intimate Details

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I know it’s not normal for you to get an updated post from me this time of time but I am at home with my sick daughter and now that I’ve sent her off for an afternoon nap, it’s time for me to enjoy some “me time” which translates to writing.  It may not be what I do best [yet in my life] but it’s one of the best things I enjoy.

When I started this blog back in 2014, I mentioned something that probably did not come off as an intimate detail in my life.  I mentioned how, back in 2004, one of the Corporals at my unit told me not to write a book about Iraq.  Now, as a thirty-two year old, I cringe more when I think of that asinine statement.  There is not a single soul in this world that deserves to tell me what to do with my life.

I think war narratives are important, even if I haven’t liked all the ones I’ve read.  The point is not to get rich.  The point is not to be famous.  The point is to convey a slice of history that can be lost otherwise.  The point is to capture sights, sounds, people, and places that are changed in the moment and hopefully influence people to take a more nuanced approach to understanding war.

As impossible as it is to whittle down what I learned in graduate school, one of the best lessons I came away with is uncovering the extent of how society ignores, belittles, and underreports the achievements and lived experiences of women.  We are not shadows of living beings; we are living, too.  I say society in this reference in speaking specifically to American society however there are many teachings that shows us women compared to men are often given less notice.

I write to you all today to tell you I will write my book.  I will write it regardless of whether it gets published.  I will write it because there will never be another moment in time that mirrors this experience.  I will write it because there are numerous others who could gain something from this type of storytelling.  I will write because a song I heard recently made me think of this experience and the amount of emotional connection I have to that point in my life.

I will not forgo a personal achievement because another human being has such set opinions against writing war memoirs.

If you’re wondering about that song, below are the lyrics:

“Every Little Thing” (Sung by Carly Pearce)

The scent that you left on my pillow
The sound of your heart beating with mine
The look in your eyes like a window
The taste of your kiss soaked in wine

Every little thing
I remember every little thing
The high, the hurt, the shine, the sting
Of every little thing

Guess you forgot what you told me
Because you left my heart on the floor
Baby, your ghost still haunts me
But I don’t want to sleep with him no more

Every little thing
I remember every little thing
The high, the hurt, the shine, the sting
Of every little thing
I remember every little thing
The high, the hurt, the shine, the sting
Of every little thing

They say time is the only healer
God, I hope that isn’t right
Cause right now I’d die to not remember

Every little thing
I remember every little thing
The high, the hurt, the shine, the sting
Every little thing
I remember every little thing
I’m haunted by the memories of
Every little thing
The high, the hurt, the shine, the sting
Every little thing

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July 2016

What a month!  It’s not over yet but it has been busier and more stressful, complete with more opportunities and challenges.  My nervousness over how fireworks would make me feel morphed into a bigger stress response than I imagined.  As a result, I have logged my chest pains to keep track of them for an upcoming appointment with a cardiologist.  Looking back, the 14 days of chest pains just gets exhausting.  Thankfully, they are not all day long but once I do have an episode I do worry if I’ll have another attack during that day.  While I have been extremely reluctant to seek medical assistance/further diagnosis about my chest pains the reality is after eleven years of suffering through them, sometimes I cannot manage them effectively on my own.  I do find it difficult to carve out sufficient exercise time which keeps them in check.  Separately, the sensation of these pains has changed over the years and I know that issue alone is pretty significant to go back to seek medical advice and assistance.

During the Fourth of July, I found it possible to avoid most of the fireworks.  My husband and I went to the Keg for a late dinner and walked over to the movie theater in the San Tan mall.  Unfortunately, some very overzealous individuals started shooting off fireworks before it was even 9 o’clock.  I had some high hopes we could miss the fireworks that night in its entirety but not so much. Although I will be flattening the conversation significantly, being around fireworks does not upset me so much because it reminds me of the constant danger I was in while serving in Iraq.  That sucks but it wasn’t the worst thing.  It is a struggle because it is a reminder of the worst mortar attack we had which killed my officer.  The sound of that attack is something that is seared in my memory more than any other one event.  It is a struggle because I know I survived that attack and while so many of us knew Captain Brock we couldn’t save him.  The Quick Response Force couldn’t save him.  The Medevac crew couldn’t save him.  We all–his Marine family–were powerless against an indirect weapon and the rest of us came home.

My daughter asked me recently why I didn’t die in Iraq.  She asked this question of me after seeing the Eyes of Freedom memorial while I attended the WAVES conference (Western Association of Veterans Education Specialists) in Albuquerque, New Mexico.  I had no answer for her other than that I was fortunate.  Even then, it’s not a full answer.  I was moved to the night shift in December of 2004.  As such, I was at my barracks the day Captain Brock was hit outside our work.  That day, it could have been almost anyone who worked in that building or it could have been no one.  I was at my home talking to my grandmother on the phone and the blast was something that was easily felt from my location.  It made the most terrifying sound of all the mortar impacts we took.

I know other war veterans understand why carrying survivors’ guilt is hard.  We have the rest of our lives to carry the burden of those who didn’t make it home.  Our existence, our homecoming, is tinged with the reminder we were granted years deprived of our peers.  We will think of the accomplishments they didn’t get to enjoy; we will think of the children they didn’t have; and we will think of the fact their families will never be the same.

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Eyes of Freedom

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Eyes of Freedom

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Catching Up: 2006 versus 2016

My apologies for being one of the worst blog authors you’ve probably put up with in a while.  Over the course of the last few weeks, I dug deep into my applied project write-up and mulled over what to include/exclude from my applied project itself, which will be a 20-25 minute iMovie.  Upon completion of my project presentation, my goal is to return to video to this site for public consumption.  It is–and is intended to be–an alternative American war narrative, so be prepared for the fact it neither feeds into the normally messaging seen in American war genre films nor is it fully on the other spectrum home to anti-war sentiments.

Earlier this year though I promised you I would also do a 2006 versus 2016, especially as it relates to giving you what I essentially feel is the other half of my military service.  Life at 3rd Marine Aircraft Wing (MAW) and my second Iraq deployment with Marine Aircraft Group (MAG) 16 represented a significant culture shift from ground side Marine Corps life. Therefore, today, I am upholding my promise to you.  Today I will start my 2006 to 2016 comparisons; while not complete, these entries that follow intermittently for the rest of the year will allow you to see the different voice I took with my writing and also contribute to a better understanding of how that time further honed my desire to leave the Corps and assimilate back into civilian life.

Please enjoy the older journal entry below, previously posted on MySpace.  (I know I’m dating myself and as I’m learning in class, I am still dating myself with my reliance on Facebook, too. )

~Cheryl

p.s. I have to chuckle at my old self, too.  I totally love (some types of) white wine now and I’m a big Tennessee whiskey and Kentucky bourbon fan.  I will probably equal disappoint a lot of people when I mention that the only sweet red wine I like I found at Trader Joe’s.

I do see some bitterness placed (unduly) on my senior prom date and this is why situating an event in context matters, which I failed to do in the journal entry below.  He was sick when he took me to prom and unfortunately, as one of the not-so-cool kids, I was in the unfortunate position of nearly every popular girl in my class coming over to talk to my date, who was older than all of us.  He, being the nice person that he was and likely still is, apologized for the state of our evening but obviously the person I was back in 2006 was still a bit hurt my senior prom did not live up to expectations.

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Me, on the left, deciding to show off my athletic physique for senior prom.

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