It’s official now: I’ve been approved for the six-month tour for which I volunteered. I still don’t know much about it; I know where I’ll be, down to a fairly small geographical area, but not who I’ll be working with, what precisely I’ll be doing, what rules will apply and what privileges will accompany the duty. I don’t even know precisely when it will begin, nor do my unit administrators; sometime within the next month is as exact as we can get at this point.
But I’m going, the only member of my unit to do so. (Another new thing for me: I’ve always deployed with the rest of my unit in the past. The language training at Fort Bragg was my only ‘solo’ duty.) One of the men who was attached to us in Afghanistan is supposed to be there also, but that covers the extent of my information.
I have some sorting and organizing to do, putting my home (such as it is) into a condition that will accommodate its being left for six months. Not a problem; I did the same for the Afghanistan tour, though my family looked after my belongings while I was in Iraq. Mostly, right now, is the matter of dealing with the inevitable paperwork.
I’m going. I can hardly wait.
* * * * *
Other issues?
Well, let’s see. We did a 10-kilometer ruck march yesterday. As far as I know, everybody made the necessary time (I stayed ahead of one person who, operating under a temporary physical profile, wasn’t even carrying a ruck). It was a rough one, in that we traveled the first half ― largely downhill ― to a set turnaround point, then had to go uphill for almost the entirety of the return trip. I got in with time to spare, but I’m still aching today.
I had intended to return to center-state as soon as the drill was over, spend some extended time with my son and ex-wife … but I have an appointment at the VA hospital (general checkup) on Wednesday, so that will have to be delayed for awhile. Susan and I are continuing to attend pre-marriage counseling, with no decisions yet made but with a clear inclination in that direction. She said that the six months I’m gone in the upcoming duty tour can be seen as a kind of trial period. I’m not sure precisely what she means, but I’ll agree that how we deal with physical separation could be indicative of other capabilities within the relationship.
And ― I haven’t yet received official notification, but I saw it in the listed results ― two of my stories were recognized in the
White Knight Awards: “
Dusk Over Pompeii” (Runner-Up for Best Het Pairing), and “
Learning Curve” (Runner-Up for “Where Do We Go From Here” – Best Post-“Chosen” story).
That’s it for now.