Enero

I'm sitting in Starbucks across from Philip and an empty frappucinnio cup at National Harbor.  We're buying time before meeting one of my classmates from grad school and her fam for dinner at our favorite Mexican restaurant.  Another last.

This morning Philip and I shared the following exchange:
P:  I can't believe we've been married eight years.
J:  I know.  They have been the best eight years of my life.
P: Yes they have been.  (and then he made a joke about our *challenging* first year of marriage)
J:  I think this last year in particular has probably been the best of my life.

It's true.  As it winds down I look back on how it started.  January.

We started the year off in Colorado.  Quite fitting that one of the best years began in one of the very very very best places.

When we exited the plane at the airport we stepped back into life.  I knew I needed to get serious about studying for licensure if I had any hope at clocking the needed 200 hours of studying to pass my exam at some point in the summer.  Things at the practice were really starting to ramp up in a way that was exciting, challenging, and really meaningful.

Midway through January we found ourselves in the Pentagon (a wild, crazy, horrible, amazing place) surrounded by brass and more rank than I have ever seen compacted between four walls.  Dana and her family had come into town for a ceremony for Dave. It was an honor to be able to bare witness to the event.  I remember being so struck by the fact that despite all of the stars in that room, the one that mattered the most was the gold one that belongs to Dana.  Following the ceremony Philip and I later found ourselves at an 0-7's house laughing until we were crying eating Maryland crabs on a newspaper-covered dining room table. (on the way to the event I found myself frantically texting a friend asking "uhh. . . what is appropriate to bring to a 1-Star's house for this kind of event???"]  It was precious precious time.  [non-mil translating:  Gold Star Spouses are military spouses who have experienced the death of a servicemember / 0-7=Brigadier General]

There are a lot of reasons that factor into why we do what we do and why we've elected to continue to stay in the Air Force.  There are a lot of things that in some really difficult, disappointing, painful moments make leaving look attractive.  But we stay for the people.  The kind of people we'd give our lives for.  The people who've given their lives for us.  The conversations and connection that we share with these people cuts through the somewhat exhausting, superficial fluff that I imagine exists in many polite, acquaintancelike interactions with people living life day in and day out at a safe distance alongside but not truly with one another.   We stay for the people we can laugh, cry, hurt, and pray with like we can Dana.  And we stay for the people who give everything in the same way that Dave did.