So I’ve been married for going on 4 months, but I don’t think I was really an air force wife until today.

I knew this day was coming but you just can’t prepare for these things. We woke up at 6:30 this morning and drove to the air port. I’m lucky to have a close-knit family because I know a lot of Air Force wives do this all alone. My mother, my father and my grandmother all came. We got there early enough to get breakfast at a little airport bistro after going through security and I’m sure it was really tasty, but I may as well have been eating sand. All I could do was stare at his hands, and his strong arms, memorize every little detail of his face, things I may not have noticed before. Where every single freckle is on his soft, sweet cheeks. They’re so light you can hardly even see them. His blond hair, and his green eyes. I love him so much, I want him to stay.

Yokota decided last minute that they wanted him to go to California for 2 months to take a C-5 class before we go to Japan. And since his class is “only” two months, the air force won’t pay for me to go with him. They say I would be a distraction. Also, I have to stay and take care of Biscuit’s out processing. Being a new Air Force wife, I’m embarking on an up hill journey towards positivity. My natural tendency is to kick and scream “it’s not fair!” But I’m realizing, slowly, that it’s just not productive to be defiant towards the military. You can’t change it. Go with it. At first, it’s really hard. I’ve spent a lot of time being angry, hurt, frustrated, disappointed, and still angry. I wanted to go down to the base and scream at everyone I could get a hold of. But I’m really trying to change my attitude. This is an opportunity. When a husband is deployed, it’s usually for three or four months. I have an opportunity, early on, to get used to my husband being gone, but for a lesser period of time. It’s like practice. And being my first time, I’m not all alone. I have my parents, and my grandmother this go round. Next time will be harder, but I’ll have an experience to go on. And luckily, they say he won’t deploy from Japan. The longest he’ll be gone is about 2 weeks at a time. I’ll see him again in 7 weeks at the Seattle Airport when we meet and head to Japan on the same flight.

But right now, in this little airport bistro, I want to stop time. It’s hard. And it hasn’t even gotten to the hard part yet. We finish our meal, my wonderful dad pays everyone’s tab (I notice Arron doesn’t fuss much, ), and we head to gate A3. The whole thing was kind of screwy. His flight was supposed to depart from gate A2 at 9:00, heading to Atlanta. He was going to get there about 10:00 and his next flight would be at 10:45 to San Fransisco. Well when we checked in, apparently Arron’s itinerary was mistaken. His second flight departs at 2. Okay…. Then, when we look at the board, it says that the 9AM flight to Atl is boarding at A3, not A2 and it departs at 10:20, not 9. So, okay, we head over to the desk and ask the lady what’s up? Apparently the plane broke so they had to bring a new one in from Atl as substitute. It should be here at 10. *wince*

So, now I get another hour of being tortured, knowing that I’m losing my baby for what seems like an eternity when you’re a newlywed. And we sit and we wait, and we sit and we wait, and I’m cold and we look for a blanket in the little store but they have nothing but Palmetto tee shirts and magazines, so we go back and snuggle, and sit, and wait, and I’m doing a really good job of keeping it together and then the plane pulls in. I burst into tears. It really hit home when that plane pulled in. He’s leaving. When he gets on that plane I won’t be able to touch him for 7 weeks. No more hugs. No more kisses. No more head scratches. No more silly motor boats. No more raspberries on my belly. Just me and an empty bed. I tried so hard to keep it in, but those tears, they came. He was the last one on the plane. I held him as close as I could. I wish I had an “I love my airman” shirt so everyone that was staring at us wouldn’t think I was a nut job, but oh well.

My husband is so strong, and so encouraging, so comforting. His hugs are so solid, his arms are so warm. He knows exactly what to say. “Baby, don’t cry. I love you.” He touches my nose. “It’s so short. It will be over before you know it. I love you so much.” When everyone has boarded the plane and he’s the last one left, he has to go. With one last big hug, he holds me so close, and then he’s gone. We stayed until that plane went all the way down the runway and disappeared into the clouds like it had never even been there in the first place. And I was leaned against that giant Plexiglas window the whole time, crying like a child that lost her father. And that’s basically what he is to me. My hero. My big, strong, hero. “Come on baby. We gotta go,” my dad says. “He’s gone.” And now all that’s left of anything that happened this morning are my two hand prints and my cheek on the window. I guess I’ve been christened. I am officially an Air Force Wife.

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