Appreciation

So I’m a friendly outgoing person naturally, and when I do nice things, I don’t think much of it. Well my team has a tradition of “fat Tuesdays” where they go to a good chow hall a few miles away here. They couldn’t go last night because our vehicle was in the shop. When I found this out today, I coordinated a few things and had two vehicles ready to go for dinner. Not only was dinner great, and it was nice to be able to spend time with my team, but they were so appreciative! I figured they would be, but I didn’t expect that many thank yous and genuine appreciation that they showed. What it proved to me was how people really do appreciate the small things and it creates a better work environment. They were pretty bummed to not have been able to go last night. I mean this food was so much better at this special chow hall that it made me homesick. Like it tasted like food that I’d get from my mom – I had some hot apple crisp with ice cream that just took me home like non other! I feel really sick now from all that food, but it was sooo worth it! I feel the “I ate too much at thanksgiving” sick… Guess I had my bday dinner early:)
So a few people are still sending me mail at my original address, and that’s not a bad thing b/c I can still get it, it just takes a little longer. It was actually a good thing tonight because while I was at the other palace, I got to pet a German shepherd dog (drug/IED sniffing dog). I knew that I was going to miss animals while here (in addition to family/friends) but I didn’t think I would quite this much. After I was done petting the dog, I could still smell him on my hands and I was hit with such a wave of homesickness that I had a hard time walking away. I just wanted to stay there and pet the happy carefree dog. After that I realized that what has kept me from being really homesick is the fact that a lot of things here don’t remind me of home at all. The food is cafeteria style (kinda ewy), the bathrooms are 2 minutes away and weird stalls, my bed is a hard spring mattress with springs that poke into my sides, I wear the same uniforms day after day, and I didn’t know any of these people before coming over here to remind me of anything back home. As hard as deployments use to be on me when Joe would leave, we always appreciated them because they helped us to realize the good things in life and to appreciate each other’s company even more. This trip for me has totally done the same thing. I miss sitting with family and friends and talking, cooking, real food, driving with the windows down in the summer (and not worrying about snipers), not wearing an M-9 on my hip everywhere I go, not walking up/down 100 steps each way to go to chow, having a bathroom 10 feet away, not sitting in front of a computer screen 14 hours a day… Okay, so my life could be a lot worse over here, but I hope these things just help you to be more appreciative of all God’s given you! I do have a great job, work with great people, at least have my own ½ a room, and am learning TONS. So God is good all the time!!!