Anticipation....

I know it will sound odd to some people (but perfectly normal to others), but I'm feeling a bit down about the Guys coming home (which is really soon... days.) I'm not down because they're coming home, but because I'm not going to be there to see it... for any number of reasons. Won't be there to hug My Guys.

First, it's nearly impossible to know when the Guys will be home since families are getting little advance warning. Families get "a date" -- which is really a time frame of about a week or so of the target for them to leave Iraq and head over to Kuwait... where they wait for availability of transport... anywhere from one to four days.

Families back here get 12 to 24 hours notice when their soldier gets on the plane. For those that live near the base, that's fine. But for families much further away -- it's a problem.

Then there's the expense: Airfare. Hotel. Car rental. Meals.

And they won't all be coming back together. A few guys from unit A, some from unit B... throw in a few from unit C, D, E... you get the picture. Finally, once they're back at their base, the Guys get an initial 48 hour pass, but then they have to get back to work (ok, half days!) for the next few weeks until the big block leave (a month off!)

Don't get me wrong -- if Noah were coming home from Iraq, NOTHING -- absolutely nothing -- would keep me from that airfield. I'd sleep in that rental car. I'd even camp out (this from a woman who thinks "roughing it" is a hotel without room service.) But our son's already back on US soil and the rest of my Guys told me not to come because they were going to [describing what they planned for those 48 hours involving booze and babes...] and they didn't want me "to see them that way"... [amid great laughter -- something about tainting the all-American Hero image they want me to have intact and more laughing.] Some will come visiting during their vacation. So that's what we agreed... but I'm feeling a little let down as the day to their return gets closer. After all, I have spent much of their deployment fantasizing what the Homecoming would be like... so it's a bit sad that it's not happening that way.

Oh, Noah will be at the airfield -- since none of Our Guys' families will be there to greet them -- Noah will be their official welcoming committee and he promised to take his camera and send me pictures to post up of the happy arrivals... and he'll have his cell phone and the Guys promised to call as soon as they were BOTG (that's boots on the ground.) Still, it won't be the same.

I wonder if I will get the same sense of "closure"? After all, I have been here chronicling the entire deployment and it seems somehow unnatural to not be there for the final chapter. Like reading a novel all the way through but skipping the last chapter to read the epilogue.

But don't worry about me. I just know I'll get over it the minute I hear that "Hey, Ma! There's somebody here that wants to talk to you..."

***********************

We can never know about the days to come

But we think about them anyway

And I wonder if I’m really with you now

Or just chasing after some finer day.

Anticipation, anticipation

Is making me late

Is keeping me waiting

Lyrics and Music: Carly Simon

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