thanks, seattle...

good to know you are there...& bekki, i know you understand the worry! :)

i just wanted to be clear that i totally understand that the if james has to leave due to his duty, then i would fully and totally support him! i would NEVER want him to give up the military when in fact it was a mutual decision for him to go active duty again. i actually feel very BLESSED that we are military! as for the home front, we would be sooooooo sad that he would have to go but we would support him and just let him know we are SOOOOO PROUD OF HIM! :) james has a duty that when called he must do.....whenever that may be!

i am glad that i am talking about this right now. i have had people ask me, "why did you go active duty military? are you nuts?!?!?!" you have to be aware that james was originally active duty army for 3 years about 11 years ago (he got out 5 months after i met him) and then has been texas army national guard SINCE then...a funny thing is also that if he had STAYED texas army national guard, EVERY unit he was with before he went ACTIVE GRUAD RESERVE (AGR) has either been sent up to iraq or is currently there right now! i think all his buddies in all his old units have already done a tour out there!! soo chances were good that he probably would have ALREADY been there if not being blessed in getting an AGR position!

james and i had been talking about going ACTIVE DUTY ARMY since we had alex. james was actaully totally against it because he said he did NOT want to be stuck in the uniform forever!! no kidding! that was his main concern!! silly man! he already did it one weekend a month & 2 weeks a year and that was enough for him! but what people are not aware of and don't know is that no where in the civilian world that i know of gives the benefits that the US MILTIARY does.....that became ESPECIALLY CLEAR when we were blessed with matthew. james had a state job that didn't pay the best and gave us benifits BUT we were paying a monthly premium of over $400 a MONTH and that is on top of copays for drs and medications and also a deductible we had to meet a year..so before matthew was born, we had already started to look at the pro's & con's of military life. i was actually ALL FOR IT and was the one that was really showing him what it offered (i know, reversed!) but i was thinking of my family. you see, in the military, our pay for a month basically was over THREE TIMES what we were making in the civilian world (and we didn't even figure THAT part of it until we got our FIRST paycheck!!)!! the military pays for your HOUSING & LIVING! what other employer PAYS FOR WHERE YOU LIVE? and gives you money for groceries and such? and gives you 30 paid vacation days a year (that you can accumulate) plus HOLIDAYS?and to top it alllll off, we don't have to pay A DIME for insurance, drs visits, & medications!! before we went military, we paid our deductible, and then each month, we were paying the over $400 + about an average of 6 drs visits at $40 a shot ($240) PLUS he had his meds at 7 a month at $25 each ($175)(& trust me, i thank GOD everyday that we HAD insurance because i KNOW there are people that DON'T have ANY insurance i can only imagine THAT! (his picu cost for JUST the room for the 98 days was OVER $800,000!! and that was just the ROOM!!) and of course that didn't include the day to day REGULAR living...when we look back on how we were making it, the only think i can say is that GOD WAS WITH US AND BLESSING US because how we made it work, I WILL NEVER KNOW!!
but anyway, there is also the retirement benefits that are the BEST too!!! that is what really made james think of it before we had matthew because in the civilian world, in the STATE job, he would retire at the age of 60+ and only get a FRACTION of what he would get military wise AND he would STILL have to pay for INSURANCE for the family and copays, deductibles ETC...in the MILITARY, you do your 20 years and get a % of your monthly base pay BUT your insurance is covered at 100% for you and your family (kids to 21 if in school)!!! who else but the military? that means that james can GOD WILLING retire from the military at age 51 with all of this a full 9+ years before he would in the civilian world! and then like he said, he can retire and work at BASS PRO SHOPS!! :) but really he wants to run his company FULL TIME then!!

but anyway, back to what i ORIGINALLY wanted to state....i am PROUD to be military and i always want to encourage other people to JOIN the military because they would get the BEST of THE BEST in the military!! alot of young people (i can say that i am 34 now! lol) don't realize what the "real" world is like...and you NEVER know what will happen! i would DEFIENTLY miss my hubby should he go BUT i would support him there and me and my kiddos would do JUST FINE, THRU GOD! i always remember the james is not the FIRST out there away from his family and some with our situation and unfortuantly will not be the LAST...we will just have to pray that GOD will protect him & his soldiers....

i knew he would have to go someday but until that day comes, you just move on and live your life day to day...