[rehashing pics from a year ago since the photography protocol hasn't re-engaged yet]

How to tell you this story without having to go into all the detailed back-story…that’s my question tonight.

Hmm….

Ok, so you know the thing I signed-up for back when & how I was really excited about it at the time?…Yeah, not so much anymore.

[too vague?]

Hmm….Ok. How ’bout this?

Soon I will be teaching a group of senior leadership spouses (think 4-star & down) on the merits of “bouncing & not breaking” along with 4 other trained spouses. The Army’s new catch-phrase for esiliency-ray (love pig latin – it confuses Google).

And as you can imagine, I’m a little nervous. For you see, like a complete & utter fool, I volunteered – no, I just about mandated that I should probably start the course off.

What was I thinking?!

Well, I was thinking that out of all the people who need to learn how to bounce & not break, I’m guessing they’re not even on the list. These women nailed that skill a good twenty years ago & standing up in front of them to preach the values of bouncing just seems ridiculous…and that whoever teaches first had better get it right, had better set the tone right & had better not offend them right out of the gate…that’s what I was thinking.

So enters the fool.

To top things off, I - like the horrible procrastinator that I am, only just tonight read the re-written material I’m supposed to teach. Re-written material specifically to address the issues & attitudes of Army spouses.

To be fair, it was re-written (although tweaked is a better word) by the other 4 spouses while I was back home. So no. I didn’t get in on those meetings – which apparently turned out to be a good thing as I heard things got a little, shall we say…”heated”.

That was mid-December. Fast forward to January & they were still beating the dead horse about which material to use. Fast forward again to February and well, politics came into play, suddnely there was a new sheriff in town & a service was finally held for that poor horse.

It was lovely; I brought flowers.

So here we are tonight. I’ve just read the “material” and oh, bugger. Some of this is total crap. (Ok, well…my opinion, crap.)

I totally get that I’ve missed my window of opportunity to throw in my two cents & since I was at that funeral I have no right to dig up that poor, dead, decomposing horse just so I can get a shot in.

And it’s buggin’ the tar out of me.

The original material was written for the Joe’s – the soldiers. The ones who needed it watered-down the most….ok, let’s be honest here- dumbed-down the most. But somehow that fact wasn’t caught by my counterparts and now I have to figure out how to say a scenario - with a straight face, in front of two general’s wives…

[ahem]

“I almost didn’t get dinner on the table because the sink was leaking.”

[dramatic pause]

Are you kidding me?

Are we really going to imply that these women…that ANY Army spouse…couldn’t figure out how to get dinner on the table just because of a damn, leaky faucet?

It just twists in my side.

Couldn’t they have figured out a different way to convey frustration over a soldier-spouse not doing something he said he was going to do?

Really?….

Just kill me now…and bury me next to that damn horse.