I keep thinking it's Friday. It is not, Friday, but Thursday in fact. This is repeatedly disappointing to me. I have no idea what I'm going to write about today, this is one of those new fangled "stream of consciousness" blogs where I just write what comes to mind in an effort to get myself back into the blogging habit. You should be excited, because I am pretty sure there is going to be some stellar writing up in here.
A crazy thing happened a couple of days ago. Colby got an email from his squadron saying that we could expect to get our next assignment some time in June and then have a report no later than date between October and January.
!!!
On the one hand, YAY!!! On the other hand, SHIT!!!
Let us deal with the YAY!!! first. Even if we don't move until January, that means that I will never again have to endure the most soul crushing months of the year in Washington--February and March. In January, it is still expected that when you go outside you will need a heavy coat, galoshes, and an umbrella made of reinforced steel. By April, there are generally enough gorgeous, sunny days sprinkled throughout the month to keep you from throwing yourself off of the nearest overpass. But February and March are just an endless progression of cold, rainy, grey days with no light at the end of the tunnel. I hate them. I will not miss them.
Hm, now that I'm spending some time really thinking about this, that's really the only YAY!!! I can come up with...
Now for the SHIT!!! There's a lot more here, surprisingly enough. First, the practical. According to Zillow, our house has depreciated in value approximately 21% since the day we bought it. HAHAHAHA. Fuuuuuuuck. We are working on refinancing right now for somewhere between 4.75 and 5.185%, which is lovely and will bring out mortgage down to a level that we could feasibly charge renters, but that means we'll be renting it instead of selling. There are a lot of ways that I would love to spend our nest egg. Funding a short sale is not one of those ways.
Second, the neurotic. There are a number of things I don't love about Washington. Namely the weather, but also the obsession with outdoor winter sports, camping and sporting good supply stores, and the criminally insane politics, but what if our next location is worse? I've heard from a fairly reputable source (i.e. some guy at dinner the other night) that Alaska is off the table for the next round of assignments. HALLELUJAH! But you know what is still on the table? Middle of nowhere Oklahoma and middle of nowhere Nevada. Do I actually think we will get one of those assignments? No. Do they still haunt my dreams and every waking moment? Yes.
Third, the emotional. I have made some seriously fantastic friends here, and I really don't want to leave them behind. I know this is just part of military life, but much like going through a breakup, it's so awful to imagine having to start all over again with a new pool of potential friends. Of course everyone says they'll stay in touch, and between the Facebook and email, generally people do, but we all know it's just not the same anymore when you move across the country. There's a chance that some of us will end up in the same place, particularly since there aren't that many options given Colby's careerfield, but there's a greater chance that most of us won't. So that's sad.
Plus, of course this just means that the hassle of loading up our belongings, finding a place to live, and hauling ourselves to the next house begins again, and honestly, we just did that.
Anyway, that has been the peakiest peak of excitement around here lately. That and the endless cycle of work, eat, sleep, 30 Day Shred, television. So, if you can spare a minute, I wouldn't be mad at you if you'd send a little bit of a Charleston or San Francisco vibe my way, and hopefully sometime in June I'll be getting the good news that one of those charming locales will be my residence for the next 3ish years of my life. (This is me making an attempt at optimism.)
P.S. This turned out way less stream of conscious than I was expecting. My apologies if you were waiting for something Joycian to evolve out of this.
