Crossing our fingers

After the political nature of the posts these past few weeks, we thought perhaps it was time to switch back to the personal for a bit.

Which brings us to Ed's approaching mid-tour leave. Theoretically, if all goes well, that is, if history does NOT repeat itself, this time next week we will be finishing dinner in Paris. Although, or perhaps because, there is plenty for Ed to help out with around the new house, we have decided to spend his mid-tour leave elsewhere. One week in Paris and one week in Prague. Knock on wood.

Several people have asked why, with less than a week to go, we are still skeptical things will actually pan out. It might be, because unlike some people (aka those running the country) we learn from history (sorry, couldn't keep it totally unpolitical). If you've already heard our tale of woe, we'll wish you a Happy Thanksgiving now. But for those who have not yet listened to Kathy recount this saga, make yourselves comfortable.

We must first go back to 1998. Ed was an enlisted man then, and one year into a four-year contract with Uncle Sam. He was deployed to Korea and stationed at the DMZ. After a few months, his good looks and ability to speak in complete sentences earned him a transfer from patrolling rice paddies with the scouts to serving as a tour guide for tourists and VIPs. He managed to secure a four-day pass for the Christmas holiday, so Kathy bought a ticket to Korea. She arrived on the 22nd, and on the 23rd took a tour up to the DMZ to see Ed in action. We managed to steal a few moments together, to confirm where we would meet the next morning when his pass began. Later that night, for some reason that can only be chalked-up to woman's intuition, Kathy called Ed to reconfirm. At which point, he announced that his pass had been canceled. Apparently he'd ticked-off one of his sergeants. As you can imagine, this did not go over well. Kathy spent the next day, which by the way was Christmas Eve, sightseeing in Seoul, alone, calling Ed every couple hours to see if he'd managed to get his pass reinstated or permission for her to come on post. Finally, around 5pm, he got permission to come to Seoul and bring Kathy back on base for Christmas. As he was boarding the bus, the sergeant who had pulled his pass walked by and said, 'I've reinstated your pass, you can go.' Of course, as he didn't have a change of clothes or anything else, we still had to go back up to Camp Boniface for Christmas, but in the end his pass was reinstated and we did spend the holidays together. However, as Kathy prepared to return home, she promised Ed that if anything like that ever happened again, she would dump him on the spot. Which just goes to show, one shouldn't make empty threats.

Fast forward six months. June, 1999. Kathy is preparing for the Tahoe-Baikal Institute summer program, but is first going to fly to Korea again for another four-day pass. The night before she is due to fly out, a North Korea fishing boat 'strays' into South Korean waters. The South Korean navy fires on and sinks the North Korean boat. The entire peninsula goes on high alert, and of course, all passes are cancelled. Kathy flies out anyway and by upgrading her to fiance status, Ed was able to bring her on post. It wasn't quite the romantic trip to Chejudo that he had planned, but apparently it was enough to keep us together.

We now must skip ahead two years. Fall, 2001. Ed is an officer, stationed at Fort Sill, Oklahoma. Kathy is just starting her second year of graduate school in Michigan. They talk one night, and make plans for Ed to come to Ann Arbor for a four-day pass over the Columbus Day holiday. The next morning was September 11. As you can imagine, all military passes were canceled.

You notice how initially it was just us being affected, and each time it's more and more people?

Summer, 2005. (It's a bit of a jump but remember, Ed was a civilian from 2002-2004). We make plans to go for a nice, week-long backpacking trip in the Steens Mountains. We'll go after Labor Day weekend. Summer is over, the kids are back in school, Kathy's job with Oregon State Parks slows down for a few weeks and the weather is still nice. And then, on August 29th, Hurricane Katrina makes landfall. Naturally, we immediately canceled our plans and sent Ed off to Louisiana to help with the recovery.

Winter, 2006. (No, it's not over yet). Ed is making plans to take a leave of absence from school in Corvallis and move to Coos Bay. And what does he get? Orders to deploy to Afghanistan. Now, he didn't actually go to Afghanistan. He got an 11th hour reprieve. As in, he was supposed to report Monday morning and was told Saturday night that he wasn't needed.

So, here's the question. Was that the start of a new trend? Will our plans actually work out this time? Or was that simply an outlier designed to make us question the previous data? I don't know the answer, but if I were you, I'd make sure to have plenty of canned food and water in the house. Just in case.

If however, we do make it to Paris, we'll post an update and let you know that we got there. Beyond that, things may go quiet for a while. Paying for Internet access given the cost of a Euro these days may be beyond our means.

Happy Thanksgiving everyone. Hopefully our next post will be from Paris.