Road trippin'

After some absolutely terrific parent-teacher conferences at Cimarron, the girls and I piled into the Kia (popped up the third row to give the kids a little more personal space).  We bid farewell to Tunia (who had already left a "surprise" on our bathmat, in response to seeing two suitcases materialize in the living room), Matt, and [not so much] Kumi (he is a great hedgehog, but not the most involved family pet, lol).

I am very used to road tripping (and traveling in general) solo, just me and the kids d/t Matt's military commitments.  I have taken the girls and Tunia to/from Japan on my own, and we have traveled to visit multiple family members during each of Matt's 3 deployments and 2 officer training (field training and IFS) assignments.  Generally speaking, our farewells are a bit teary-eyed d/t uncertainty (markedly more so during deployments than officer training--the only uncertainty in the latter was whether or not Matt would pass [field training d/t a last minute calf injury and IFS d/t extreme motion sickness]).

However, I was not expecting to see Matt tear up as he walked us out to the car.  He commented (on his inability to join us d/t not being able to take leave during training): "It's like I'm back...but I'm not."  Sad though those words were, I also know it was mostly the stress talking--as Matt is still given a good deal of time off during training, and had his sister-in-law and her fiance been free the weekend earlier, he would have been able to accompany us thanks to a three-day pass for Columbus Day.  It is common for anyone who has family within driving distance to take full advantage of those passes (we have other ones coming up for Veterans Day, Thanksgiving, Christmas, and New Years).  So there are plenty of opportunities ahead in the future--permitted we are willing to take a chance driving in Oklahoma's snowy winters.  Fortunately, we are looking forward to back-to-back visits from family sandwiched around Thanksgiving.

Back to Matt's stress: he starts Phase 2: The Flightline on Friday the 21st, and has his "dollar ride" to look forward to the following Monday!  Which means he is tackling the hardest (claim based on failure rate, averaging 2 students/class) academic unit, weather, until then.  Can't wait to see him up in the air, and the girls are super excited too!  :o)