I am writing this to first wish Arlo a happy first year's anniversary since we both promised each other that we would be together for life. In another week it will be a year since we parted, when he dropped me off for my trip to basic combat training, and our promises were put to the test. We wrote each other, I called when I could, and I was lucky enough to even get home for Christmas. He made the long drive to visit the following year, and flew a second time. By mid-July my training was over and I was able to visit on a regular basis again. Living together is a good few years off and that works out just fine for us. While we both build our careers and enjoy our final years of living fully independently, we prepare for many years together in the future! We will be making the most of the next five years, and will be making many journeys to see the other until then.
Arlo, I will do everything to make this work until I collapse in a happy heap. Happy first year together! I love you even more than I did a year ago, but not as much as next year.


To my friends out there: I love you all too, and I miss many of you! One of you is here on base with me and I think it's just great that you are here. Others are nearby and I will be seeing a lot of you in the near future. Many more are far away, some I haven't spoken to in years. I want to let you know, I have not forgotten you all.

24 days have passed since I reached day 0 and graduated! Haha, so my countdown leaves me at day minus 24. Up until yesterday I was free and those days felt just as amazing as I knew they would. I enjoyed and appreciated every last minute of it and I could write a small book telling of the places I went and the people I saw. Some of the best moments though, were simply being alone, haha! I was so glad to be able to sleep and shower without being watched, for once, and not being required to be accompanied if I so much as went out for a cup of coffee. I did however enjoy the company of Arlo once more, and finally, we could remain together after the sun went down.
Meanwhile, today I just got paid for all that wonderful time! I love this new job.
day before yesterday I reported to Fort Campbell and dread swept over me again, but it was the same sort of ill feelings I had when I first went to college, rather than the sense of doom I felt reporting to AIT. It's the feeling of being away from the familiar and unsure of the future. I was up at 4:30 the next morning. Got weighed and measured then basically released until Monday!
Amazingly, it turned out I'd arrived at the start of some sort of holiday weekend so at 6:30 AM, Thursday, my weekend began! I up and screwed it up by taking the bus to breakfast and accidentally getting off miles away from my car and being ushered into an orientation briefing I wasn't scheduled to take for another week. It lasted all damn day til almost 3 in the afternoon. OOPS. So goes the life of a scatterbrain.

I was approached yesterday by an NCO at lunch and told that he had been reviewing my records, and said I was doing very well, and to keep it up until I graduate.
A few words of encouragement there, gave me the morale boost I needed!
I have just over 3 weeks left here until I can see the home I've missed since December! See my family again, it's been at least a couple of months for some of them, and see my mate again, and finally spend a night together without worrying about having to be back for curfew.
I'm prepared to ace the physical fitness test day after tomorrow, despite the nasty bruise on my leg. Any other injury like this I'd be upset about, especially so soon before a physical aptitude test, but this one was caused by my buddy dropping a Hellfire missile launcher on it. not many people can point out a scar on their body and say it was caused by a rocket launcher!

Arlo flew out here last night and will be just off base until Tuesday next week. I slipped out to spend a couple of hours with him before duty, and it really put my mind at ease just to have spent a little quality time with him. We ordered anchovy pizza, which is one thing we bonded over in the first place, and watched the newest Bedfellows, which coincidentally was about anchovy pizza! We got a great laugh out of that and enjoyed our little precious time together. Between tomorrow and Tuesday we will have a whole lot more time, thankfully! By the time he departs, I'll only have 56 days left in training. We won't be living together for a few years because of our jobs, but we will live close enough we'll at least love together on the weekends.
Last weekend, I gathered the courage to finally tell my mother that I would be marrying my boyfriend after I graduated, and I got a very anticlimactic, nonchalant "where are you two going for that?". So, that off my chest and getting no family objections, I'm ready to keep on keeping on with our plans. Our future keeps looking brighter, and I'm regretting less and less giving up my home and old carefree lifestyle.

I'm still searching for some great artists to create some new artwork for me, and also some gift work too. It seems every artist I have talked to so far has been overwhelmed with commissions already, or they are too busy with other things. If anyone knows of someone good who is ready and willing to make me something, I would love to know who! Until then, I keep looking.

Life drags on, day after day. Another Friday is here and I've earned a higher phase since I last posted, receiving my 5+ card two Friday nights ago. It didn't involve too much work, just making my room clean and neat as possible, memorizing some long creeds, and taking another written test. It lets me sleep in late on the weekends and leave base as early as 6 AM. I earned it solely for the purpose of spending as much time with Arlo as possible when he visits next. I find reminders of him everywhere--and I have found it amazing this week, the little signs I find.
A couple of weeks ago our instructor was making coffee for our sleepy students, and I'd wished I had brought one of my many mugs with me from home. He offered free ones that had been left there a long time ago. He brought out a few used coffee mugs, some used, but one was new and shiny. It was a tall purple shiny metal one with a plastic lid, with the label sticker still on the side. I immediately took it, as Arlo love purple so much. So now I tote this to class some days and drink from it and think of him. Then, earlier this week, after getting a surprise move to a new room, I lost all of my pencils (I found them yesterday) and I arrived at class with no pencil. I happened to see a purple mechanical pencil on the floor, just in time! He also loves plants like I do, and is especially fond of honey locust trees, which are in full bloom (and wonderful aroma) this time of year. Our morning runs take us down a road lined with them, and I become intoxicated by their smell, and they are lovely to look at too. While it brings me great cheer, I also become overcome with that blue feeling of what I'm missing every day in my life. It's not only Arlo I'm missing, it's also my family. It's those familiar places I used to go, and all of the great friends in my life, that I left far behind. I just keep in mind with each passing day, that I'm another day closer, and never going to do this again. 74 days, and I'll be driving again, back in Kentucky, visiting whomever I wish on the weekends, taking vacations, trips, having my own home, and I'll be married for the first time in my life, and there will be no turning back. I just have to finish surviving here, but I just never know what to expect. Things are always changing here, but I am encouraged every Thursday as I watch guys I've seen for many weeks now, packing up and leaving. Soon, it will be my turn.

Day 100. I begin the great countdown tonight! I have suffered through 149 of the 249 days in Army training, with 100 days remaining before I get out of here. Monday starts in just minutes and it begins day 99, and may it kick off the week right! Feeling good, getting to bed at a good hour, and I just scrounged up a 1 pound bag of peanut butter M&M's someone left when they graduated. My week is already off to a nice start =D

Today was pretty damn good considering it was a Monday. It's now the wee hours of April Fool's Day. I just about shoved a buddy through a wall for tellingly that we were going to war with Russia. I am currently lounging on my bunk in my new almost private room, munching on a bag of MRE-knockoff Corn Nuts I scrounged up while digging through abandoned lockers of the barracks, along with some unfortunate kid's passport and 35 cents. What a day it's been, this Monday.

I barely slept at all the last couple of nights in this dingy old barracks. Friday night through dawn Saturday, I slept on pins and needles anticipating the arrival of my dear Arlo, who drove over 300 miles through the Appalachians to see me just for one day, and the morning of Sunday. Not allowed off base nor allowed visitors during the night, I was broken-hearted that he was just over 3 miles away and I was not allowed to see him til morning. After some difficulties getting onto base, he arrived during a barracks lockdown for an inspection. I sneaked away from my room and opened a window of a random room when I saw him wandering outside! I was so happy just to see him just 50 feet away from this gloomy building with his bright smile. We were forced to go get clean sheets, make our beds and stand by for re-inspecteion after about half an hour of waiting to be inspected in the first place and the frustration was just overwhelming. I ran like a gazelle to his car after breaking away from the line, opened the door and gave him the quickest, sweetest kiss I'd ever had after not seeing him for over 90 days. I dropped two bags of licorice (our favorite candy) in his lap and ran back to duty! With the minty taste of his gum still on my lips, I ran, glowing, off to grab my sheets. Luckily, we were immediately released as soon as fresh sheets were put on, and I'd never run out of a building so fast in my life. Into his car I ran for 12 hours of just Tru n Arlo time. BEST day ever since October last year! Today, he came by for a little time together before he hit the road back to Lexington, and when he dropped me off, he left me with a slice of his sunshine here at the barracks. No tears today--our bittersweet parting was more sweet than bitter, as he promised to return on several more occasions before I graduate from this Hellhole, which just got a little nicer just from my mate setting foot on its soil!

Happy, happy news all around, despite being locked up in a military base until July, away from everyone I love, and the places I used to enjoy so much. I will marry my sweet Arlo in July, and hopefully bring him with me right away to my new duty station...in Fort Campbell, KY! I'm coming home, sort of! It's a 4 hour drive from my hometown, and 3 hours from Arlo's family, but that is the entire point: so he can see his family on a regular basis after making this incredible leap of faith. I will never let him or his family down. While I'm in here, I'm drawing a steady paycheck, none of which I spend, while I make chumpchange on the side working guard shifts for my comrades and collecting, trading and selling stuff that graduates leave behind in the barracks when they leave. I'm building onto our nestegg while I'm trapped in here, and after Arlo and I are married, thanks to last year's new ruling that same-sex couples receive the same benefits in the Army, my husband's housing allowance checks will allow us to live together without having to even touch what I've saved! I can't wait to get home, get in the cockpit of that hot Challenger, pick up Arlo and haul him to New York!

121 days and a wakeup, and a new life will begin.

Happy "Everybody in America Thinks They're Irish Day!" I celebrated yesterday by leaving the base for the first time since I got here on January 31st, with my mother, brother and little nephew. My nephew is so darn cute. My brother, kind of a douche but I love him anyway. My mother, as classy and kind as ever. It was a wonderful outting and I ate well, and enjoyed some new atmosphere for awhile, even if it was overcast and chilly. Saturday after next, my boyfriend, mate, fiance, will be here to see me after making the long 9+ hour drive, and that will make the next two workweeks all the nicer knowing I have that to look forward to.

2013 to 2014 was like black to white, for me. I could spend all year writing about life since I last posted anything on here. It's all for the better and life is amazing! More to come.

My FA page was started back in 2007 purely so that I could view friends' material,
otherwise I had no desire to devote any more of my time to such furbaggery.
Yes I'm slow to adapt to such internet sensations. I never got a Myspace page, I created a BS Facebook page so I could use the chatroom, and I refuse to Twitter, ever. Something (no idea what) inspired me to actually do something with my FA-space, so here I go. Maybe it's because I'm actually becoming somewhat of an artist. I write, yes I do! I keep it all private, used to RP, (and well) when I had the time, but that's it. Nearly three years ago I began writing a novel, but life got in the way about 2 months and 10 pages into it. In July, I resurrected the story, made a new outline, changed some names, and scrapped the original completely and started over. This time I'm perhaps 15 pages in, although I've all but stopped writing again.
Blame it on class, overtime at work, and a couple of new oddjob projects I've been asked to do plus I went to Camp Feral!, but this time I like what I've written so far, and I intend to get back on it after my first exam tonight. Currently, I'm taking a break from studying (brain...exhausted...) and figuring out how to use this damned FA-thing. Obviously, I just now figured out how to make journal entries.