You know… It’s really nice when people want to thank military spouses and families during Military holidays.

BUT

All I’m doing is what any other military spouse does. The cooking, the cleaning, the wrangling of small children, the paying of the bills, the fixer of problems – large & small, at least until The Man returns.

And the spouse? HE (in my case) got to get up long before the sun is even THINKING of rising to deploy to some foreign country for however long he had to go, for however many TIMES he had to go, had to try catch me at the EXACT moment that I would be home to try to squeeze a WHOLE LOTTA CONVERSATION into a 5 minute phone call because other people need to use the phone too — OR not be able to talk to his family because something happened and they’ve cut communication stateside, wait for my trifling ass to send his care packages (which was at least once a week, without fail. And yes, I was the wife who sent contraband smut and liquor, along with spam, and baby wipes. Very much related: that shit gets expensive, yo.), he had to go out on patrol, and pretend like he wasn’t scared because I was pretty much a hot mess the whole/every time he was gone and he didn’t want to make it worse, he ALSO had to ignore the fact that he missed his family, and his friends because for him it was the only way to make it through that whole ordeal. EVERY TIME HE LEFT. He also had to watch/hear/read about his brothers in arms who did not make it home.

I guess all I’m saying is in comparison to what my military man does, I didn’t do anything. Shit. I won’t even give the bum in front of the Mickey D’s a dollar. HE was willing to die for his country. *I* just made sure his kids didn’t starve while he was gone.

As a military spouse, I have a more personal connection to days that honor the military. Because more than most, I know exactly how much they sacrifice to serve. And I won’t lie, I have a special place in my heart for all Marines. But if The Man hadn’t decided that he was going to be a Marine, I’d just be another woman who married her high school sweetheart. Instead of the woman who gets to bang a man in uniform, the BEST uniform. (Yeah, that’s right. I said it)

In Memorial to all of y’all who serve, have served and those that died serving: Thank you.