I woke up to a brief Facebook message but started my day off disappointed that I didn't get a phone call. As of tonight, it has been almost five days since I've heard his voice and that is enough to cause a bad day in itself.
I went back to sleep, thinking I could waste the day in bed but I forced myself up around lunch to get ready for the Martin family reunion. This is the reunion of Ethan's family on his mom's side. To be more specific, his great grandmother's side of the family. I felt obligated to go for several reasons, the primary reason being that I wear her ring on my hand. Passed down through generations, it landed on my finger and that is enough to get me out of the house. It was tough being around E's family for the first time since he's been gone. It didn't feel right without him there, and of course the looks and, "I'm sorry"'s when people I didn't know found out where he was didn't quite help.
I made myself leave and spent a crazy amount of money buying things for Ethan's care packages. Somehow, making these care packages have become very therapeutic. If I can't hug my husband and talk to him and take away all the bad things in his life, then the least I can do is immerse myself in making sure that he opens up the closest thing to "home" I can give. These are the two I spent the weekend decorating, and I think they came out quite nicely:
After I got back home and filled up the boxes, one to send tomorrow and one to send next week, I decided to take advantage of my bedroom window overlooking the town and curled up beside Roo to watch the annual Soldier's Reunion Cruising. I people watched for awhile because the cars weren't really important to me. I saw kids laughing and waving, grown men act like children on Christmas as they salivated over engines and paint jobs, and the general consensus as I looked around was happiness. It was sickening. I wanted to scream from my window that it was so inappropriate to be celebrating and acting like this week was somehow special because we attached the word "soldier" in front of it. Like using that word gives us an excuse to have fun instead of going about the mundane. I realize I was incredibly unfair in my emotions, but they were mine, okay?
I wanted to stop everyone and tell them that this war is not over. That there are troops over there RIGHT NOW being attacked while we look at cars and parade around the square in these things that cost more than makes sense in my head. I wanted to cry because how, how on EARTH can I celebrate while my husband is in Afghanistan? I can't bring myself to do it. I don't know how these people can do it. It isn't their fault... it's mine for being an emotional mess. I'm allowed to be sometimes, though.
Life goes on and today was such a stark reminder of it. The war doesn't stop, life doesn't stop.
It just keeps going.
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