stand beside her and guide her through the night...

... I haven't been all "yay America" recently.  Truth be told, I haven't been "yay" many things other than "yay clean diapers" or "yay baby who slept through the night."  But especially America.

This has nothing to do with the election.  I secretly (half-way) love election season because we all sit down and talk about things that are issues instead of just complain about them.  Wait, that's a lie again... we don't talk, we scream them at each other and nothing still gets done.  But still, the concept, of thinking about things... and that "ah ha!" of feeling like a fresh start after the election is over (plus, bonus, everything is less dirty because all the stupid campaign signs come down).  That's all pretty good stuff.  Anyway, that's not my issue.

My issue is that America has taken my husband away.  Again.  And the bigger deal to me is that America has taken my little girl's daddy away from her.  This is so much harder than when it was just me.  Because, man, look at what he is missing..

Now, serving in the military is his (our) choice.  And I am usually quite proud of the sacrifices he (we) make for our country.  Especially compared to some of our military friends, who have paid the ultimate sacrifice, and babies whose daddies are really taken away from them.

But last week, I stumbled upon a chat forum on the Facebook where someone started by saying something like "We are thankful for soldiers." and although there were many people who agreed, there were also lots of posts on that forum that said awful, awful things about soldiers.  Like "I'm thankful every day for dead soldiers" or "everyone who has been deployed should be shot" or "I can't believe anyone who isn't crazy would want to go over there and cause all that mess, and be able to come home with a clean conscience."  Awful things.  Were there people who tried to argue with them?  Yes.  But it wasn't me.

Arguing with people like that doesn't help, and only ads fuel to their fire.  But it makes me sad.  Sure, argue all you want "your husband is gone so that these people can have the right to say whatever they want and be free from retribution."  Point taken.  But I'm hurt by it, none the less.

Enter Veteran's Day:  suddenly Facebook is all about thinking Veterans are awesome.  Suddenly EVERYONE I see on facebook is into this holiday.  That's great, because it's never been a holiday I particularly cared for.  And, for that day, Facebook almost evened the scales and made me less mad (to make up for the fact that it's where I got made in the first place... second place (yes, how, hmmm, well)).

And it got me thinking about all the people who are like "yay Veterans" all the time.  And that didn't used to be me.  But I also didn't wake up in the middle of the night to sing songs I make up to a baby, so clearly the people you "used to be" can change.

So... YAY VETERANS!  YAY people who want to make a difference.  YAY to the veterans of wars where they came home to protesters (which really chaps my hide, because there was a draft on, so a lot of people who got yelled at for coming home didn't want to go in the first place).  YAY to the brave men who go out there today and see the hot-mess that is Afghanistan (or other choice places), and live in it.  YAY to the mothers and the fathers who send their sons and daughters into that hot mess.  And YAY for the wives and daughters and sons who wait patiently for them to return... and try to be happy with just phone calls and emails.  YAY to my husband, a brave and strong man who deals with all my crazy, and the fact that Facebook makes me all upset, and he has to talk me down from it. 

This is the last time they saw each other.  I hope to fix that soon.