The Update Show

There are flowers on my desk at work, three big orange Gerber daisies, two perfect white tulips whose petals look like they could hold at least a shot and a half of liquor, and several sprigs of some pinkish blossom whose petals look like those plastic cap gun rounds that come on a red plastic ring. I think these flowers are an apology, or maybe a preemptive strike against any complaints I might have about the past month of work. Ironically it's not the actual stuff-load, the tasks, that have been taxing, even though they came in an epic tsunami of deadlines and small crises. It's the way general communication has been carried out (or ignored) that's got me worn down to a mean little stump. But it's a policy of mine never to blog about work, so I'll resist the temptation and just say that the flowers are very pretty. And I'm cashing in some overtime forthwith.

So much can happen in a month. Pants went to the boat again and owned his qualification flights. They give an award called Top Hook to the guy who has the most accurate landings and another called Top Stick to the guy with the highest overall grades in this last stage of flight school. Pants got them both. Top Pants. He also got the biggest "I told you" from me, and a long half-drunk lecture full of rhetorical questions about the value of failure and tests of character.

Then he left his cell phone on the roof of my car, from which it rocketed sometime during the drive home and was then crushed under the wheels of-- no kidding--a convoy. We deduced this two phoneless days later after digging through the car and couch cushions of nearly everyone we know, and when he finally found the forensic remains of the phone (it's SIM card mere sparkles on the pavement, tragically) Pants collected the bits and brought them home in a ziplock bag, which seemed so grisly and clinical, like what investigators bring out after the shark autopsy has yielded chunks of your loved one. We're grisly people, though, so the shattered phone is now displayed on the fireplace mantel next to the splintered remains of the model rocket I built that blasted out into the stratosphere before turning an about face and drilling into some poor sucker's car hood half a mile from its launching place.

Also, good news. Military Move Roulette, a game I've always lost in the past, finally took a blessed turn and we're getting to stay here in California for the next three years. Three whole years. At least. That's the length of our marriage thus far, and in that time we've lived in four towns in three states and evacuated for three hurricanes. I am so passionately in love with the idea of this small chunk of stability that I immediately ran out and got a new cell phone and a local number (conveniently precipitated by Pants' poor cell phone custody). If that hadn't wiped us out financially for the time being, I'd be tempted to print up some address-specific stationery, or maybe tattoo my zip code on my ass because it's going to be accurate for so long.

Now we're debating a couple of big, Real People questions-- should we buy a house? Or maybe move into one of the neighborhoods on base? I'm having a hard time keeping a straight face with these questions because it seems I've been post-collegiate apartment hobo for so long. Surely someone will come by and realize that that's a dorm room futon we're passing off as a couch, or that our dining room table is a glorified card table cleverly disguised under classy linens. Oh, but a house... Really I just want a place of my own where I can plant weird herbs in the garden and paint murals on the walls of the garage.

And can I just rhapsodize about all the possibilities now that I get to keep my job and stay in one place to finish my MFA? I was so high on California love today that I reorganized my whole office at work and alphabetized a massive wall of books just because. Just because I can, and because I'm putting down some roots for me, not for whoever they'll get to replace me. It's the workplace difference between renting and owning-- everywhere else I've rented a job and worked like a demon to be reference-worthy and memorable because I knew there was a good chance I'd have to leave suddenly and soon. Now I know I'll be around, barring some catastrophe, and I'm finding it nice to tend the lawn and fix the gutters so that it'll be easier and nicer for me longterm.

The best thing of all, though? Pants is not scheduled for immediate deployment. We've got a while yet, during which time he'll train some more with his new squadron an I'll... I don't know, skip around happily? For the first time, we've got time, and it's marvelous.