Living the military life can be both incredibly awesome, and totally miserable.
You get to live in places all over the world, on the military’s dime, and you get to experience things you’d never normally experience thanks to this.
The flip side of this travel collage is that you make friends, and you then get to say goodbye. Either you are leaving, or they are leaving, and if you happen to meet them at the end of your run in a place, or at the end of theirs, your time is even shorter. For most this is not an issue, but for people like me (and like the friends I have made – mostly foreigners like me, let me add – but not all) who find it hard to open up to people in the first place, having to speed up the “making friends” process can be horribly uncomfortable. Because of this, I don’t make friends. I actually try and make a point of not interacting too much with people because it takes me so long to trust and to find common ground.
However, I also try very hard to make “doggy friends” so that my dogs don’t feel alienated and “left out” when we move to a new place. Most of these “doggy friends” stay just that: people we meet at the dog park, or occasionally see out walking and join on a loop of the neighbourhood, but then one or two come along where our dogs just click, and we just click, and that’s it for my hermit mentality.
Now, through experience in this life, when it is time to say goodbye I tend to find myself feeling numb, aloof, and detached.
Saying goodbye to my friend Stephanie and her dog Frost, (and her husband Mike as well – though I was closer to Stephanie because of all the time we spent together daily with our dogs) today was difficult. I could feel the walls coming up already as she walked back to her car – “Don’t look back!” I said, because I knew if she did I would probably cry – and my heart turning in on itself, as per usual. I will be very sad, believe me, but after a few days I will move on with my daily life, back to my hermit ways. Back to weeks of silence, except for enlightening conversations with my dogs. I’ve done this enough times now to know that while it hurts right now, it will ease and it’s not like this time I’m going to another country – we can still be in touch!
But she and Frost were the reason we got going in the mornings: our walks were important. She also kept us on a routine in the evenings – we had to walk, or Frost would get up to mischief all night!
What will kick me in the soft bits later is when we go for our evening romp and stroll to and from the dog park, and the dogs wait impatiently at the fence for Frost and Stephanie to arrive… and they won’t be joining us ever again. That will hurt. My dogs are my children, and knowing they are confused and missing their buddy, that will hurt.
I know all the dogs knew there was something going on today (and for the last week, really, with the coming and going of Stephanie and Frost, and me as well) as Odin was very clingy with me, and Azzie wouldn’t leave Stephanie alone when she came to drop our vacuum cleaner off.
They will feel it when we go out, just the 4 of us, on our walks in the forest, or through the back streets of the other ‘hoods. And no more ‘hood walks, because we no longer have our body guards with us – Stephanie and Frost made us feel safer, even if it was just for the most part positive thinking, rather than practicality.
But, we got our day at the beach,
our walks in the sun, in the rain, in the wind, in the forest,
on the streets with our friends. These memories will stick with us always.
Safe travels, my friends.
Welcome, officially, to the military life.
Hello!
And now, time to say goodbye.