Sunday, January 27, 2013

Remembering to breathe


Relative to my upcoming deployment, it's been ten days now since I found out I'm being sent back to Southeastern Europe, and I still have had no contact with anyone who's been able to tell me what I'll be doing, exactly, and how things will work along the way of getting there.

On top of that, a week ago yesterday I received a letter from the California Guard saying that because *they* cannot find their paperwork concerning the $10K "signing  bonus"  I was paid (the shortage of Chaplains Army-wide had prompted this largesse, but in other military operational specialty (MOS) classifications, the bonuses were much, much larger), they're going to recoup their money from me.

After the Charlie Foxtrot that was my accessions process, my having been deployed twice, having moved twice, and having changed storage facilities twice, I cannot find my copies of that paperwork either.

Last Saturday night, before the retreat in Malibu, I was ready to tell the Guard Bureau to have fun in Kosovo without me, but I managed to remember what my friends who go to lots of AA and Al-Anon meetings keep telling me, and which I now repeat pretty incessantly to others: Remember to breathe!

Subsequent to having remembered that direction, and more pointedly after having engaged that practice, I did not act rashly and in rage.

But it sure can seem like an attractive option nonetheless.

Blessings and peace to one and all,


Fr. Tim, SJ
View My Milblogging.com Profile

No comments:

 
MilBlogs
Powered By Ringsurf