Ten Days Hence...

I only have ten days left "officially" in the army. Two weeks ago, I wrote about my last day in uniform. I've since moved to a new state and begun a new job in which I am surrounded - once again - by servicemembers. It is strange but liberating at the same time. I work among (not "for") people who far outrank those who made my life absolute hell over the last six years. Some have already begun calling me "Danny". I haven't been called that in well over two decades, but it is so much more preferable than the You-Are-Not-A-Real-Human-Being-To-Me, "GO-TEZ!!!".

Even though they are all at least a decade my senior, I've been asked many times, "what is it like to adapt to civilian life?" It is a simple enough question, and I am enamored by their genuine curiosity. I've crossed a bridge that none of them have. No matter how much they love the uniform, everyone wants to know what it's like to get out. I think they want so badly to hear the same things I wanted to hear when I was in their "boots".

The truth is that I haven't yet adapted, and I'm not shy to say so. Until a month ago, I was still having Iraq dreams. Until a couple weeks ago, I was still having army dreams. And I am still having "out-processing" nightmares (out-processing is a series of nonsensical bureaucratic procedures with the single purpose of overwhelmingly daunting the soldier into reenlistment).

It seems that my subconscious trails my cognizance by at least a month. I hope to write - in twenty days' time - a similar entry to this called "Ten Days Thence...". By then I expect to be caught-up to the present. I hope so very much because my new reality is an unbelievable improvement on the one prior (thus the importance that I come to realize implicity that which is so easy for me to see explicitly).

After the things I've dealt with so far, I feel confident I can live my life as the person I am; not the person I think I should be. I know that confidence will be challenged time and again in the coming year(s). This will be my next challenge, but I am far more willing to deal with it than the unspeakable nightmare from which I hope to have finally emerged. And at my back, thankfully, I no longer hear time's wing'd chariot hurrying near.