Life is What We Make It

Every so often, it’s empowering to take stock of where you are on this military journey. Ten, even five years, from now you may look back and be somewhere completely different than where you expected or planned you’d be.

I know I definitely am.

I was the career girl when we started this journey. Kevin joined the Army out of ROTC. Both of us are from Springfield, Missouri. We were high school (though not the same one) sweethearts. We attended the same college, only he graduated and I took my dear sweet time. While he finished school, I went to work full-time and let college take a part-time back seat. We married, he commissioned, and he announced we were moving to Fort Hood, Texas.

At that point in my life—and still today—this ride was the ultimate adventure. So, I told my company I’d need a transfer, and they found me a job in Austin, Texas. Kevin had to attend school in Fort Sill, Oklahoma, and I moved on down to Fort Hood and set up our life.

It was an easy life (except the one-hour drive I made to and from work each day to Austin—yuck!) with two full-time paychecks and no children. I was full-time career girl going gangbusters, moving up the ladder. I traveled all over the U.S. as a training manager. I didn’t have time to miss my husband. Quite frankly, I hadn’t had time to know what I was missing.

We were apart more than we were together. I was recruited by another company, moved to Temple, Texas, to run a store, then on to Killeen, and Kevin joined me at our first duty station.

I’ll never forget the day he introduced me to the “Army.”

Now, I’d visited him at school at Fort Sill, but it was just on the weekends. I knew what the post looked like there and at Hood as I drove past the gate every morning on my way to work.

But, I’d never visited the commissary.

I’d been in one PX.

I didn’t socialize with anyone at Hood. I had my own group of work friends I stuck pretty close to, and none of them were military or even understood our (what I now know as crazy) life.

His introduction to me was, “We have an event, and you need to be there—it’s at 5 p.m.”

Now, remember, I’m a working girl—5 p.m. with a one-hour drive home wasn’t going to happen. Fast forward to the phone call—you know, the FRG type. I answer and she promptly goes through her spiel of her name, that she’s my leader, what I needed to bring, and that the meeting was “mandatory.”

I went into a tizzy! Who did she think she was telling me she was my leader? What the heck does she think, I’m Betty Crocker? And who makes things mandatory for spouses? What the heck is this Army thinking, anyway?

Kevin got an ear full. Oh, he tried to explain, but I wasn’t having any of it.

I eventually came around. I found a battle buddy, attended social functions, and decided this was an “okay” life.

But, I must admit—I spent the next four years of my life subliminally convincing this man that he needed to get out of the military and find another job.

I remember the day that he was making the decision to “stay or go,” whether to drop papers or go on to the Captain’s Career Course. I begged him, “Let’s blow this joint!” But, he chose to stay, and I supported his decision. I, however, told him that if he chose this life, then that was that and we were doing this. I left my career in retail, finished my degree, and we welcomed our first baby girl.

Then came 9/11.

Everything changed that day—our nation, our lives, our military journey. I don’t think we knew what was going to change, but we knew that we signed on for more than we actually thought would ever happen.

We signed up for war.

We left Fort Hood for Fort Sill, Fort Sill for Korea, and Korea for Fort Stewart, so the war was well underway before Kevin spent any time deployed. Our family grew from one to two girls and added a few pets, too. Our military journey was also well underway before I decided to log into this life and participate.

Man, if I knew then what I know now.

You’d never be able to convince the girl—that career girl—who hung up on an FRG leader that she’d be called “Oprah of the Armed Forces” by Katie Couric due to her radio show, Army Wife Talk Radio.

That she would be running a network of more than 31,000 spouses (and growing) called Army Wife Network.

That she and her battle buddy would be traveling the nation, delivering conferences and writing columns.

That she’d be taking a job with USAA to run their military spouse forums.

That she’d care enough about this journey and Army families to delve into volunteering on her local installation, or that she’d even be so amazingly fulfilled from work with no pay.

Most of all, you’d never have been able to convince her that, in less than 10 years, she’d be an author of a book where she celebrated 1001 Things To Love About Military Life. 

There’s just no way. 

Look around you and embrace what today brings. Know that you’re exactly where you’re supposed to be today. Celebrate that, even if it means you’re struggling. Celebrate the lesson you’re learning from your situation. Realize that if you don’t fall you can’t get up. If you don’t make mistakes, then you weren’t trying.

I don’t know what you’re doing right now. I don’t know what you love. I won’t even pretend to know what fulfills you. But sometimes, neither do you.

Sometimes, when we’re lucky, our passion finds us, but we have to be open enough to accept it.

Life is what we make it, always has been, always will be. —Grandma Moses

How will you make the most of the life you have been given? How will you realize your dreams? Share with us!