last summer, before mr.a left, we spent a lot of time just having fun; being silly and carefree. i guess we knew there would be plenty of hard days ahead; so it was like we were building this foundation of happy memories to balance out potential pity or resentment, future sadness and loneliness. as much as we just wanted to enjoy every moment together and ignore the mountain ahead of us, inevitably there were times we had to talk about It.
i'll never forget one of those conversations when he said,
we're not all coming back.
it shocked me that he would even say that. i guess subconsciously i thought, if you didn't think about it (and certainly didn't speak of it), it wouldn't happen. that somehow our ignorance would control our fate and it would always be "someone else."
last week, it was someone else. twice.
someone's son. someone's brother. someone's uncle. someone's husband. someone's daddy.

spc. don nichols and sgt. brent maher, both serving in the iowa national guard,
lost their lives in two separate ied attacks.
lost their lives in two separate ied attacks.
when it's not your someone you vacillate between grief and relief.
you cry for them and pray for their families. you send your condolences and donate money. you want to honor them and remember their sacrifice.
you cry for them and pray for their families. you send your condolences and donate money. you want to honor them and remember their sacrifice.
but at some point you have to stop.
my heart is very heavy.
that may sound sterile, but fear is debilitating. and when your soldier is still fighting, you can't live each day thinking, that could've been us. there is a delicate balance between honoring the soldiers and protecting your sanity. some days i'm a little too close to the grief, others i'm admittedly too close to relief.
this isn't my most-eloquent moment, but it's taken me a week just to get to this point. i couldn't bring myself to blog about anything else until i got some of these thoughts out. i know there is more i could say. or probably less. my thoughts and emotions are really jumbled and, honestly, i just need to end this post.
my heart is very heavy.