Ten-year retrospective

[aadler]

 
(Inspired by the one here by bellatemple.)

What do you call the years 2000 through 2009? The Zeroes? The Naughts? Who knows? I’m just glad they’re past, so we can move on. (And, yes, I’ll be equally glad when we get past 2012, so we can put that whole Mayan-calendar-end-of-the-world silliness behind us.) Whatever you call them, that was a ten-year period where things happened. In the world, and — much more importantly — in my life. So:

In the last ten years, I have:

Had seven different jobs — alphabetical order, not chronological, and several of those jobs overlapped:

• Certified Nursing Assistant
• Loading dock and shelving in a home décor store
• Night security
• Pizza delivery driver
• Retail inventory
• Soldier
• Web site maintenance

Lived in eleven ‘structures’:

• A college dorm primarily for international students
• 2 apartments (one for college, one for language school)
• A guest house
• A room rented from my mother
• A tent – Iraq
• 3 CHUs (containerized housing units) – Iraq (toward the end), Guantanamo, Iraq again
• A hootch – Afghanistan
• A rental house

plus temporary housing in barracks in California, Wisconsin, Pennsylvania, Washington, North Carolina, and New Jersey (that I can remember)

Been on four Army deployments (and one period of non-deployed duty):

• Iraq, 2003-4
• Language school (Fort Bragg, studying Persian Farsi)
• Afghanistan, 2005-6
• Guantanamo Bay, 2007
• Iraq, 2009-present

Owned one car (’98 Ford Escort, which I will continue to drive until it disintegrates, and then buy another used car)

Had zero pets, but my wife is currently keeping:

• Beauregard, a poodle, who has nailed the poodle trifecta: ugly and stupid and bad-tempered
• Graham, a schnauzer, more intelligent and more amiable but balances it by neurosis and disobedience
• Mariah, a black-and-white cat, who will still on occasion stir her lazy butt to chase the light from a laser pointer
• Alex, a fat tiger-striped cat, so bland of personality that I almost couldn’t remember his name
• Hu-li, a mixed-breed dog so beautiful that you wish someone could turn it into a regular breed, but even more neurotic and pees about a quart — on the floor — every time you turn your back on her

Been to eleven foreign countries:

• Italy (airport stop only, in Rome; they wouldn’t even let us off the plane)
• Kuwait (staging to and from Iraq, and once to and from Afghanistan)
• Iraq (deployment)
• Qatar (four days R&R)
• Afghanistan (deployment)
• Germany (passed through several times in transit, plus two weeks leave)
• Kyrgyzstan (several days’ stay while leaving Afghanistan)
• Canada (just a bus-ride to the ship for an Alaska cruise)
• Cuba (deployment, Guantanamo)
• the Netherlands (with my wife)
• Belgium (with my wife)

Written in five fandoms:

• Buffy the Vampire Slayer / Angel: the Series (different shows, same world) – 39 stories, 7 drabbles, and working on another story right now
• Superman – 1 story
• Alias – 1 story
• snippet, MacGyver/Modesty Blaise, with sroni
• Magnum, P.I. – 1 story, a birthday present for my wife

plus another two if one counts crossovers:

• Mannix
• La Femme Nikita

Bought five laptops:

• A Toshiba that I picked up used, on eBay. Got years of service out of it, gave it to my kids when I replaced it. I later learned that my daughter had broken it in a fit of temper. Not her finest moment.
• A Gateway, purchased when I knew I was about to deploy because I wanted something with a DVD drive. I used it through three deployments before replacing it, and still keep it around as a spare.
• A Toshiba that I bought at Guantanamo, because my Gateway was getting creaky.
• One that I gave my son for Christmas. Don’t remember the brand.
• A Compaq I acquired at Fort Dix, because I left my second Toshiba with my wife.

Been in four relationships:

• One that fizzled out without really going anywhere
• One that burned hot and bright but was then over within three months (though she took another month to admit that she had decided it was over)
• One that kind of ambled along without ever turning into anything
• One that came swooping in out of nowhere and turn into reconciliation and remarriage

And, in miscellaneous stuff:

• Finished a Master’s degree
• Got an official finding of nullity, by the Catholic Church, on my ended marriage; irony, but 1) the marriage ended in 1997, 2) the finding of nullity came through in 2001 (I’d been in no hurry), and 3) we didn’t reconcile till 2006, or remarry until 2007
• Joined the Army
• Watched my son grow eight inches taller than me
• Underwent surgery for — so far — the only time in my life
• Lost my mother
• Bought a house
• Survived a few earnest but impersonal attempts on my life
• Studied two languages
• Collaborated on two stories with my daughter (one of them short-novel length).

Ten years. Good years, though there were definite bad spots. Wonder what the next ten years will bring?

Grandchildren, maybe?