Feeling: resolved
Listening to: Vienna Teng - My Medea
Reading/Watching: Vice & Virtue in Everyday Life - Sommers & Sommers

I wrote this. He replied with this. Then I went over that night to find out what he was talking about, because he said he didn't want to talk about it over the phone (something that is rare and rather scary).

The air force wants to send him to Korea. For a year.

I, of course, responded to this news in a very mature and appropriate way. I sobbed and bawled like someone had pur�ed my mother. I felt horrible about not being able to control the tears, because obviously this wasn't something he was happy about, and my histrionics only served to make him feel worse, but I plead temporary insanity. In that moment, I had no sense of perspective, no patience for the passage of time, and my world was ending.

He said that sometimes, people can turn down a PCS (Permanent Change of Station). Sometimes, if it's the first term of your career, there are no repercussions. Sometimes, if The Man wants to be a jerk, you are sent somewhere else (say, Baghdad), or forbidden to re-enlist, or even kicked out (fired, expelled, etc). And sometimes, if Korea really, really wants you, they'll send you no matter how many times you refuse.

He is trying to find a way out without pissing anyone off. After a day to calm down, I came back to him and told him that he shouldn't do anything to jeopardize his future. If he wants to continue in his career, instead of stopping after one term, he should just go. If there's a chance that they'll fire him for it (and he'll lose any college scholarships he earned), he should just go. I don't want him to regret burning these bridges someday.

What's one year, out of sixty? I know if there's anyone I can trust to be true to me while we're apart for a year, it's him. I know if there's any relationship that can last through a year of separation, it's ours. I sure as hell know I can survive a year without a boyfriend (seeing as I spent the first 20 years of my life doing it).

I don't want him to go, but I've realized that his leaving does not equate to my losing him. And I can handle it, if I have to. It's kind of like how I deal with pain: sometimes, I'm a big baby about a hangnail or a paper-cut, but when I have a growth the size of a cantaloupe in my abdomen, I don't scream, or thrash, even shed a tear. I will be the same way about this.

(And I will not get my hopes up about the possibility of his getting out of this until it is definite. I will not celebrate or even hope until this is over.)

As a side note, Bri is finally out of my life. After years of fighting and childish tit-for-tat, I am finished. Yesterday I was not sufficiently supportive about her bad haircut, and she kicked me out of her car. I walked home. Because it's not like I had surgery a few weeks ago or anything.

That was it for me. And I'm telling you all this now, because I want to make it impossible for my pride to give in to her again. I want everyone to know about this, so that if it comes to a day when I want to forgive her, everyone I know will smack me upside the head and cry, "What the hell are you thinking?!" Just the threat of that will keep me from changing my mind.

There. We're all caught up.

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