Day 313: Commitment

Today, my husband re-enlisted in the Army for an indefinite time period. What that means for all of you non-military people out there is that he has committed to serve in the Armed Forces until he retires. While technically, he signed the papers a few weeks ago, today was the official ceremony for Tiger Squadron.

Chad has served his country for most of his adult life. He served for four years in the Marine Corps and spent about 18 months as a civilian. He decided that, despite all the downsides of military life, he belonged in the military. He joined the army after 9/11 and has been serving in the army for over eight years now. He has about seven and a half years before he can retire. He can choose to stay past his twenty if he has career aspirations that he hasn't met or to increase his retirement. That is a bridge we can cross later.

Right now our eyes are looking toward 20 years as the magic number. After four deployments, we are really looking forward to some time together, stateside or overseas, but together for a couple of years would be nice. He realized awhile ago that being a soldier is more than his job, it is who he is. He is not perfect, but he is so amazing. He is such a great example to me of what a soldier should be. He pushes himself to be the best he can. Who he is as a person encourages the people around him to be better. He takes time to get to know his soldiers and tries to find strategies to help them.

People think marriage is a big commitment and we go into it, regardless of how well we think we've thought it out, wearing rose colored glasses. A few years in, and if you're lucky, the bloom is a bit off the rose, but you've learned to love the stem and appreciate the thorns and still have enough romance to make a new bloom once in awhile. I heard a study on the radio, conducted by Reader's Digest in February that said 37% of married people would not remarry their spouse if they knew what they know now. What is interesting, if you look at the study, that number is of married people, not divorced. If one out of every two marriages ends in divorce and 37% of those people aren't happy, that is 69% of marriages either end or are not satisfying.

But my husband is in a relationship where he is completely under the control of a government agency with random representatives, some mentoring, some awful, some harsh, some gung-ho, but all with absolute control over every aspect of his life. He spends over half his life in another state or country from his family and works 14 hour days as his normal workday when he is home, 20 or overnight is not unusual. His weekends are never guaranteed. He can be assigned any duty regardless of family plans, gets no sick days and has to have weekend getaways approved in writing two weeks in advance to visit anywhere farther than a 3-4 hour drive. He can be even be recalled from leave or a pass due to the actions of another soldier. As often is the case, a soldier goes out and gets drunk or arrested and all leaves and passes are canceled for everyone because they are worried someone else will get into trouble too.

I could spend a month telling you how hard his job is, how unfair it seems at times, how demanding of his time it is, etc. but I just want to ask you to really think about the commitment that he and 30 other soldiers made today in his squadron alone, to commit another 4, 6, 8 or indefinite number of years to serving at the pleasure of the army. They knew what they were getting, roses and warts, and chose to do it all again. I know my husband made his decision for many reasons including planning for his family's future, but mostly because he takes genuine pride in helping people and protecting our values and way of life.

Standing in the desert sand, seeing his daughter grow up through grainy pictures once a week and missing the freedom to have a beer at the end of a long week, he swore an oath to protect our rights to do the very things he gives up over and over again. Now, that's commitment.