My family is about to enter the military life season of deployment. Even though our seasons skip along in the predictable pattern of getting ready to deploy, deployment or deployment recovery, the actual “he’s gone” part always takes me a little by surprise. I live in absolute denial that it’s actually going to happen, even while verbally stating it as a fact and shrugging my shoulders in reticence when friends respond with "that must be hard."
Deployment denial doesn’t actually make things easier. It just means that the emotions that I’m ignoring now will hit me with even stronger force later. They don’t go away – they just linger in the background, waiting for the opportune moment of weakness to make their full impact.
Which is why when I saw a favorite military wife quotes on this military spouse blog, I knew I had to claim it as one of my deployment mantras:
Every season contains within it the potential for beauty, and we draw more of that beauty into our lives by our response to whichever season we’re in. -- Jamie C. Martin, Mindset for Moms
Beauty potential during the suck-fest that is deployment? Is that even possible?
In the moments of absolute loneliness where I miss him so much and am so afraid that he won’t come home, I do want to think that beauty isn't possible.
But it is. For me, at least, it has to be. Because I have learned through my military life that attitude is everything.
And so I am going to choose to make this life season of deployment beautiful. I am going to choose to grow as a person. I am going to choose to not sit at home and wallow but instead use every minute to its fullest.
I'm going to choose to believe in the potential for beauty.
