Do Not Go Gentle Into That Good Night

Source: Do Not Go Gentle Into That Good Night

Do Not Go Gentle Into That Good Night

I liked the person I became in the 23 years I was married to Phil. I learned to trust myself and to dream big. Life was filled with possibility, fun, and the comfort that came from knowing that even if I fell or failed, someone, my someone, believed in me and would love me anyway. It was strength forged of time tested hurdles, life events, and the moments. Like most people, I thought there would be more moments.

The day after Phil was killed was the day we were supposed to find out if we were going overseas again or if we would be returning to finish out his career at the Academy. We stood poised. There was the excitement of the what ifs and what next. When Phil was killed the what ifs and what next became two questions I no longer wanted to consider. Life was survival; possibility and dreaming big became a desperate whimper. Stuck in the horrible vicious cycle of trying to figure out who I was without my Phil, where I fit, dealing with trust issues, and the loss of my military culture and the place I once fit, left me standing on the curb hiding as the parade marched on.

Four and a half years later, I am still figuring out possibilities and learning to dream again. Where once I was pretty confident about where the road would lead and what my gray haired years would look like, my prisms have shifted. Quite simply, I am struggling with figuring it out. I am no longer paralyzed with fear, but the reflections are warped and the way ahead is fraught with my own confusion and doubt about who I am now and where I fit now.

Like a teenager, I am trying new things and finding that certain things still work. Running is one thing that still fits. I am able to bridge my past, my time with Phil, and my way ahead in the miles and miles covered. I found my confidence in traveling and in fulfilling the dreams that Phil once had for me, but once I finished a marathon in every state, I needed a new goal or a new dream. The Great Wall of China Marathon and the marathons that I want to run in Dublin and Avignon or Marseille are part of that plan. Phil was never a part of this dream, but as sure as I breathe and as sure as I live, I know that Phil would support these endeavors because he believed in me.

Other areas of my life are harder to navigate. I still struggle with where I fit in. I knew who I was as a military spouse. Now? I am part of the military world through work and through the benefits I received by Phil’s death, but I don’t fit. I am no longer a key spouse and I no longer have that strong dashing man in a blue uniform next to me. Even something as simple as going to the base chapel isn’t so simple. Everyone else has a family and the focus is on family connections. It leaves me wanting and wishing. I navigate all of my boundaries with one foot in the past and one foot in the future. There are good days and bad days, but the confusion and shaky confidence are new.

I figured that at 54, I would have more answers and that my life would be more than it is now. I don’t want to figure out the way ahead, yet I know I must. I must because Phil had no choices and he died before he could realize many of his own dreams. To quit, to stop looking ahead to the possibilities, is to be waiting for my own final breath. The answer is evident. I have to fight for it. No retreat, no surrender, and I have to trust at some point the way ahead will become clearer and more comfortable. I step knowing that by learning to dream again is what Phil would want for me and what I want for myself.

Learning to Forgive

Source: Learning to Forgive

Source: Learning to Forgive

Learning to Forgive

Source: Learning to Forgive

Learning to Forgive

I fall short all of the time in what I have done and in what I have failed to do. Through my thoughts and actions, I have inflicted unknowing pain on others, yet I do try to be the best version of myself. Lately, it has been about extending forgiveness even when forgiveness seems so difficult. It has been about restoring trust in humanity. Today, something epic happened in the most unexpected way.
Most of you who know me or who have followed my journey, know of the fear I have felt. That fear started when Phil was killed and was intensified after the Boston Marathon. I developed xenophobia towards a culture and a people. Watching Lone Survivor yesterday (based on a true story) of a group of Aghans who protected an American soldier at the risk of their own peril, opened the door slightly. Today, it is opened even further.
I couldn’t get into my regular dentist and I needed to have my broken tooth fixed. I made an appointment with a new dentist–a woman whose family fled the brutality and provinciality of the same culture I fear. She saw my bracelet and asked about it. She teared up as she shared her family’s story. We sat in stunned silience looking at each other. She, the judged, and I the aggrieved. Both of us innocent and both of us simply trying to make the world a little bit better for having lived in it.
The movie and the dentist reminded me of what my Phil believed when he volunteered to go and help set up a broken country. Phil stood for the oppressed. He came from a country in which people fell into two classes–the haves and the have nots. He came from a country in which if a person’s values or thoughts conflicted with a the government, opportunities were nonexistent. He never lost sight of the freedoms and opportunities given to him by his American citizenship. He volunteered to go and to be a part of the solution because he felt that it was the right thing to do and he hoped that if Emily and I were repressed in the way that Afghan women are, or if any of our freedoms were not a given, that somebody would come for us. Phil went to the schools bearing gifts because he knew how much the small things meant to the young children with nothing. It was in the education and the friendships that Phil felt change could occur.
Today as the dentist and I stared back at one another, we recognized the gift, the lessons, and the hope for a future. Today we recognized the shared ties of loss and the positive way forward. While I will not tell you that all fear is gone, there is that quiet understanding that not all people of a certain culture are bad and that they indeed are a piece of my fabric.

9/11 and Moving Beyond Fear

Source: 9/11 and Moving Beyond Fear

9/11 and Moving Beyond Fear

Until 9/11, I lived a shroud of naïve ignorance believing that terrorism was something that would never touch my country or my life. Terrorism was something that happened to other people in far off lands. I had lived in Europe for 8 years at that point and while there were threats, I never really considered myself to be in danger. Phil had deployed numerous times all over the world and I had long ago stopped worrying about his safety. I held the smug assurance of confidence in the uniform and in the borders of our country. Never had I been so wrong. Terrorism has taken a lot from me. It brought fear into my life starting on 9/11.

I was in OH for an Air Force training on 9/11. During a routine bathroom break, I noticed many people gathered around a small television. I made a joke and as the people stared back at me mute, I could barely comprehend the images playing out on the screen in front of me. A plane was crashing into the first tower. As I stood trying to comprehend what was happening, the second plane hit. As the day wore on, I watched in disbelief at the devastation to our country. The numbers of people lost or impacted by the events of that day were beyond staggering.

I was far from my family in UT where we were stationed. They were hunkered down at home while the nation sorted out our country. When I was finally allowed to fly, it was in a quiet and mostly vigilant plane. Fear etched the wary faces whenever anyone got up to use the restroom. The flight attendants fear matched those of us forced to fly. It was many flights later when I began to relax and to feel that we had somehow figured out how to thwart the unthinkable evil of that day. I was wrong again.

Terrorism took my dreams and my future when a man pretending to be a friend and an ally–someone my Phil should have been able to trust–assassinated him. This terrorist had eaten with my Phil and shared family stories with my Phil, yet he looked at him and shot him time and time again. Phil was not in a combatant role. He was in a trainer/Advisor role. He was in Afghanistan helping their government set up their infrastructure so that they did not have to live under a cloud of fear and repression. Phil had volunteered for this role truly believing that through education and empathy he could change people’s bend towards harming others that do not follow the same ideologies. He was in a role that should have been safe. He was working with people that wore a friendly uniform and yet a man who had stood against the Taliban for more than 25 years chose to become a terrorist assassin.

Beyond the devastation and the broken heart, I began to feel fear in a whole new way. I had problems trusting people and more than that, I no longer trusted my own perceptions. I cowered afraid and unsure, but I knew that I could not give up living because in the choice to live and stand up to my fears, I know that I have a moral victory over terrorists. Phil’s assassin would have had a double victory if I stayed inert or afraid, thus I pressed on. Never was it harder than after 15 April 2013.

I had been invited to run the Boston Marathon to honor my Phil and his sacrifice for our country. I was running steady, sure, and happy to the finish line. It was a magical day and a perfect place to be remembering Phil two years after his death. I had finished 26.1 miles. I could see the finish line and I was one stop light away from a physical and moral victory when the first boom hit. While I was processing what that boom might mean, the second boom hit. All hell broke loose around me. Like those around me, I fled for my life. I did not know where to go to be safe. I did not know what was happening, but I did know something terrible was playing out.

I don’t know how I got there, but I got to a Dunkin Donuts store away from the finish line. I stood in shell shock shaking fear. I do not know for how long, but that day has changed me. I no longer live in my rose colored glasses. I recognize the brevity of life and I recognize the need to continue to live my life as a testimony to the resiliency of the human spirit. Terrorism is not taking anything else from me. While they can destroy my body, they cannot have my spirit or my words. I am not living in fear, nor am I giving these monsters real estate in my heart. As hard as it is, I am taking back my finish line one faltering step at a time.

How am I doing that? I no longer wait in the shadows. I live my values. People matter to me. While they have always mattered to me, often they were second to the job, to what I thought I had to do, to my fatigue, etc. No longer. I step forward trusting that I will be given enough to do what I need to do as I press forward time and time again speaking of loss, bouncing back, faith, and more than that HOPE in times of darkness. Darkness seems never ending, but even in the darkest places the eye can find the smallest of lights. I seek to be that beacon or that harbor because it anchors me and gives me that moral victory over the fear that terrorism brought into my life. I seek to forgive some pretty big things because I have recognized that by holding anger and resentment, I have given the terrorists real estate in my heart. I do not want them to occupy any more of my thoughts. I want my actions to be my retribution.

Is it easy? Some days are hard fought for. I am lonely and I am certainly not living the life I thought I would be leading, but it is about taking back my finish line. A marathon is 26.2 miles long. I never think that I have any race in the bag. I am going to want to quit. The 26.2 miles seems too long to push through. I know that the miles are going to hurt and that it is going to hurt my body more tomorrow and the next day, yet I also know that if I look only at the step in front of me I will get to the finish line. Life is like that. If I breathe through the hard times and the fear, I will get to the finish line one second at a time, one minute at a time, one hour, one mile at a time, one marathon at a time. It is going to hurt and I am going to want to quit, but I continue on because I simply cannot let terrorism have any more.