Reflecting

REFLECTING -
I’ve been looking over some of the pictures that were taken before I left home so many weeks (2) ago (although it seems like forever), and one of them is a picture of me and my three girls in Colorado. The picture was taken at the Gym before just before I left and I’ve noticed that there are no happy faces on the screen except my three year old. The others know what’s going on at this point and are clearly not happy with it. Their faces show the impending stress of the upcoming year and their eyes reflect the sorrow and loss that I know I feel. My blonde baby girl, however seems blissfully unaware of what’s about to happen. While I look at it and reflect on it, it tears me apart inside and my eyes want to well up with tears that I can’t let go right now. I look at it and see the innocence of youth, the blissful lack of stress on her face, the way her smile brightens up the picture – how in contrasts with the world around it, and I miss that. I miss her running up to me, jumping into my arms, giving me kissing and telling me, “I already gave you kisses, daddy,” when I ask for more and, “Just one more, that’s it,” when I tell her, “just one more.” I miss her putting her hands on my cheeks and turning my head to look at her when she thinks I’m not listening, I miss the softness of them, her smooth, new fingers, eager to explore everything – especially her nose. I miss her running naked through the house, up and down the stairs, pulling me over by the finger to see when Dora comes on the TV, or she needs help with a game on the computer. I miss her spinning the barstool around when she wants me to get up. I miss her “It’s ok, daddy,” when she or I break something. I miss her wanting me to stack blocks, knocking them over when we finish. I miss looking into her eyes and seeing unconditional love, a love that you can’t get from anywhere else except from a child who doesn’t know that you screw things up, that you aren’t perfect, and thinks you are the be all and end all of the world. I miss throwing her up in the air and catching her as she squeals with glee and asks to do it again and again until I can’t lift her, much less throw her. I see all of this, and so much more in the picture. This picture is the epitome of light and dark, hope and despair, joy and pain, and I just hope that when I get back, she still has the same light in her eyes and unending energy and life that she did when I left. I hope she doesn’t grow out of it before I get back.

I miss all of my girls and my boy, I miss my wife and I miss my dog and I miss them all in different but equal ways (except the dog, I miss her a little less than everyone else – but I still miss her). I could go on and on about what I miss about each one, about how my oldest has beautiful hair that feels like silk to the touch, how she’s always eager to do her homework, and gets so frustrated when I tell her what’s wrong so she can fix it, her desire to do her best in whatever she’s doing – from soccer, baseball, school or anything else, she always does her best; how my son rolls his eyes when you tell him to do anything except play the computer or Playstation, how he rides his bike around the block and gets better each time even though he’d rather be playing computer or playstation; how my middlest daughter tries so hard to be like her sister, to the point of annoying her to no end, how she wants to make everyone happy (when she’s in the right mood), and how she loves to draw and color and make pictures and paintings and arts and crafts for anyone and everyone, and how she has little to no inhibitions about talking to people or doing things for people; how my second youngest, the Princess of Pouting bats her doe eyes and pouts her poofy lips when she has to eat something she doesn’t like, or she doesn’t get what she wants, and how her face lights up with everything she DOES get and how her eyes look like they will almost fall out of her head she gets so excited. I miss my children, I miss them greatly, and on one hand, I hope this doesn’t hurt them, but on the other, I hope them miss me as much as I miss them.
I miss my wife, and I could go on for eternity about what I miss about her, how I miss her, every detail about everything she is to me, but it would be an unending entry and would defeat the purpose of an ongoing saga such as this is. I only hope she knows that I miss her more than any words can ever hope to express. I hope she knows I love her, even if I had to come here, had to abandon her to her own devices for the longest year of my life. I know I tell her I do, I tell her everyday, with every chance, but its not nearly enough, I feel her in every breath, in every ray of sun, with every step my mind wanders to her (and maybe I can blame that as the reason I stumble on my way to everywhere I go).
I miss my home, I miss my mountains, the snow capped peaks, the blinking tower on top of the mountain outside my window, the cold, crisp winter air, the rain the comes down like a fire hose and the sun that breaks through the clouds and dries up everything within the hour. I miss the lightning that we used to watch from the porch, or when we’d drive to Sig Hill to get a closer look. I miss the time lapse pictures we’d take to capture the magic on digits so we could oooh and ahh over them later. I miss the booby clouds, the green sky when it gets a little crazy, the way the clouds rolled over the mountain like a dam breaking in slow motion.
Instead of there, I am here, doing my job, and hopefully making a difference, in my own way, to the people here, to the country, maybe my one year here will help to bring them a lifetime of a home without the pain and suffering they have endured so far. Maybe the adults don’t or can’t understand freedom like we do, life like we do, but maybe its not too late for the children to breath the air of freedom, to live in a world without the danger of being killed for a misspoke word. I hope they come around, I hope we help them, because if we succeed, them my year away from my family, my sacrifice, their sacrifice, will be worthwhile. While I have everything, but am away from it, they have nothing, and live with it. I give of myself, I give of my family, so that these people can have just a morsel of the feast that I would be enjoying during any other year.