Return:Leave :: Sadness:Numb

I picked my favorite color to write this in hopes that it would make the words easier to say.

"This time will be different" is all he said. Taking a long deep, almost burdened breath as if he knew something we did not.

"I won't be in close proximity to any danger. Besides, most of the hostility has moved. This is a safe zone that needs basic security." Again, his tone was shaken as he tried to assure us.

"This is a chance to earn a real living. To break the  paycheck to paycheck lifestyle. That sorta life is crap. One year in the box and we won't have to do that anymore. It will all be better in the end."

No one bought into his futile plea. We could see the cracks beneath the stone facade. He was scared.

These were the words spoken from a brother I love. A brother who sees no other way out of financial bondage than to take a high paying civilian job as a security provider in Iraq.

How do I feel? I am torn. And once again question if I possess empathy or whatever emotion is it that allows one to express even a little concern about the matter. I am numb. I will remain numb until he boards the plane and is out of reach. Then I will cry and I will long to hold him and I will wish I wrote a letter telling him all the ways he's made me a better person, and thank him for being the best big brother.

How do I know this is what I will do? Because I have done this once before. All the hype surrounding his preparation to leave for the Iraqi War made me mute. I went day to day with a permenant cloud in my mind. Not sure what to say or how to say it, until I watched him walk down the terminal. It was at that moment that the flood gates opened and I wanted to talk until my tongue fell off. But it was too late.

I am hoping it is just the shock, that this time I will be smart enough to say things before it is too late. Two weeks hardly feels like enough time to say all I need to say. How did this go from "I'm just considering it" to "I am going to be on a plane in two weeks. I'll train for a week state side and be overseas after that."

How do I embrace the fact that he won't be here to see me graduate in December. He won't be here when Dillon gets home from California for the holidays. He won't be here to see Ashley make it through nursing school. He won't be here to offer Ethan advice. He won't be here to see Tynan graduate from highschool. He won't be here to hunt with my dad or eat dinners with my mom. He won't be HERE!

Suddenly, me going out of state for grad school is put into a very different light. What sort of impact will my absence have?

The other side of me believes that if anyone can do it, he can. I also know that although he may be able to put himself back in the box -eating MRE's, peeing in a ditch, sleeping on a mat and enduring scorching days and freezing nights, that his absence will undo his wife. She says she will be strong and that "with him gone, maybe I'll actually get some school work done". But her strong-will will fade to worry and over the year she'll spiral into some form of anxious depression. She needs him!

But I have to look at all angles and so far I haven't really considered his. For three years he's been searching for a job. Oh, he has a job, but he has been searching for THE job. A job that makes him feel like he's fulfilling his role as a husband, as the provider. A job that makes him feel like a man. A job that he's proud to wake up and go to. And the fact that Ashley has been burning both ends of the candle being a student and the sole income is slowing been etching away at his heart. He told me not too long ago that if there was anyway he could ease her load he would. If he could give her a break and see her restful and happy it would make him a happy man.

So I have to believe that he is not doing this for the money but for love. And that is noble.

I will miss him. We will all miss him in some form or another but we will all love him just the same.