Well... my initial freaking out has subsided. I love my husband too much to do anything other than make this work no matter out. My serenity, though, I think has less to do with that decision than with the vicodin I've been taking since having a root canal yesterday. Although there is never a good time for major, invasive dental work, the timing for the mind-numbing drugs couldn't be better.

I can't believe this is happening. Really. My husband just made a D in physics... which would not be a big deal except that he was already on academic probation in his officer's program for dropping a class last semester, and I'm pretty sure a D will not remedy that situation. So in all likelihood, he will get dropped from the officer's program and sent back to the fleet to serve enlisted for 6 years.

While it will be awful to have to finish out my last year of law school in DC alone while he is in Norfolk or the Persian Gulf or wherever, the next year is not what I am primarily worried about. I'm worried about the next 6, 7, 8 years during which we will be trying to fix his failure and the impact it is having on our lives.

The first problem I see is my social isolation among the enlisted wives. Many of the wives I've met already view me with suspicion and derision because I am so very different from them. I don't have kids and won't for at least a while, and I am really focused on my career/education. Human nature dictates that differences often breed distrust and contempt. And I will be very different. And the officers' wives will, I think, be barred from being my friends because of the navy's rigid caste system. How will I get through a deployment with no support system?

And then there is the employment problem. As much as I hate to say this, many civilians have a lot of contempt for enlisted people. And lawyers are, in general, a particularly elitist and snobby group of civilians. I already have to defend my husband's lack of a college education to people at my law school, and I hate it. How will lawyers at any prospective firm with which I interview view the educational disparity that will exist between my husband and I? They might doubt the integrity of our vows and hesitate to hire me because i would not be a worthwhile investment since I will probably not be in Norfolk for long. Or they might think I'm some dominating psycho who wants to be worshiped and in control, so I purposefully seek out less accomplished men whom I can control. And I know for a fact that they will not treat him well. Because I see already how some people look at him knowing that he hasn't completed college. At least he was here finishing his degree. I am so scared that my peers will look at him and see only failure now. And look at me and see only... trouble?

And even if it does all work out for the immediate future and I do get hired somewhere and make some friends who can support me, I will not be able to have children for many many years. He will need to be supported through his last few years of college when he gets out of the navy. And then supported while he starts at a new job. And by the time we are financially stable enough for me to consider cutting back to part time and starting a family, I will be 35, 36.

And I am so scared of waking up in 10 years and looking around my childless, lonely, professionally lackluster life and realizing I hate him for all of the things he made me give up. But then I am also scared of hating myself for giving him up and pursuing my professional and familial dreams without him. Because I love him so much.

I am so mad at him for letting this happen, though. How do you make a fucking D in a class when so much is riding on it? How can you let that happen? I am so angry and I feel so betrayed because all of our dreams and plans were dependent on the successful completion of this stupid program and now it is all gone. Just like that. And there is nothing that I can do about it.

I hope that I am wrong about the reception I will get from the enlisted wives. I know I will be excluded from the officers' wives. I hope that I am wrong about the lawyers down there. I hope I am wrong about everything. But hope is in short supply around my house right now. And now I think that I need to go and cry some more for the future that probably will not be.

Instead of finishing my jurisdiction brief or finding a place for us to live, I am obsessing over my grades. Three of the four are up. They were all due in on Monday (Why it takes well over a month to grade these exams is a mystery). I cannot update my resume and send it out to Hampton Roads firms until all of them are up. And, naturally, the only one that is not posted is the only one that I am actually worried about. So far, though, so good-looks like Dean's List for this year!

I'm trying to figure out if there are any military resources or networks I can use to try to get a job in HR. I'm worried that because I am looking for something really specific: first-year lawyer at non-corporate law firm, I am not going to have much luck. But I know that there must be other lawyers who're married to people in the military out there, so I'm keeping my fingers crossed.

As part of my work-related procrastination, I've been reading through some of the militaryesque communities on LJ, and some of them are HYSTERICAL. Particularly amusing is some girl who is apparently some sort of uniform whore with a new victim every week. She's not interesting because she's intelligent or unique-mostly because she's peculiarly obsessed and has devoted a lot of time to the pursuit of uniformed ass. She has even created some sort of shrine on her wall to her conquests.

http://www.meghanashtonjane.net/about_the_webmaster.htm

Aside from her (okay, including her), this kind of crap really makes me sad. And angry. One of my husband's enlisted friends met some girl right before he got deployed. According to my husband, he didn't really like her, so he figured it would fizzle on its own when he left (I'm not sure I believe that). Anyway, the girl, unbeknownst to the friend (I'll call him B), went through B's phone and got his parents's number. While he was on cruise, she called his parents and engraciated herself to them. His parents tell him they love her and not to screw it up. B gets home and falls into her open arms. She conveniently gets pregnant immediately thereafter... or so she says since he never saw a pregnancy test or ultrasound or anything. They get married in a quicky ceremony performed (again, conveniently)by her internet minister uncle. She quits her job. And then she loses the baby that no one is really sure ever existed and suffers no ill effects: not physically or emotionally.

If she was telling the truth about all of this, I feel really awful for her, but somehow I kind of doubt it. It's all just too coincidental and convenient for it to really be plausible. Anyway, now B is even more broke than usual, and the girl refuses to go back to work to help out because she wants to stay home and try to get pregnant again. It just stinks that there are women who will prey on the lonely military guy just to secure... what? A steady paycheck? I just don't get it.

And I also don't understand how these women who have no interests besides their husbands/boyfriends/whatever can survive when said husbands are deployed. I'm already scared shitless that I am not a strong enough person to handle it-even with a job (always the optimist) and hobbies and stuff. Without those other things to distract me, though.... I can't imagine I'd be anything other than bat shit insane. Which, I guess, might provide an explanation for the behavior of those other women.

I need to go feign productivity until I can sneak away for lunch.

http://abcnews.go.com/Sports/wireStory?id=877314

I really love the Spurs. A lot of them used to come into the bar I worked at in college, and they were all really nice, laid-back guys. Except for Malik Rose, who used to drink blush wine, which is totally unacceptable behavior for any man. But since he's not on the team anymore, it's okay.

I'm pretty homesick now. I haven't been to SA or anywhere else in Texas for over a year. My husband and I are going to go and visit my dad in a few weeks. The husband wants to go to San Antonio and meet some of my college friends who are still lurking around there and to see the infamous bar previously mentioned. I'm scared that his wife's partying collegiate ways will scare him horribly. He was kind of straight-laced, at least relatively, during college. I was, relatively or otherwise... emphatically not. I honestly don't know if he can handle it.

Even more disturbing is his desire to go into Mexico for a day. I have no problem with Mexico, but Mexican border towns are a whole different, evil story best left to underage drinkers. What little I remember from my trips to Nuevo Laredo is more than enough for me. All I know is that there really is such a thing as a donkey show.

The upside of my being worried about these things is that I am distracted from what should be my real concern: two weeks of quality time to be shared by me, my husband, and my dad. The stuff of nightmares.

I have been sucked into the blogging black hole, and I can tell already that I am going to find it addictive. The anonymity is seductive; I like the idea of being able to vent without actually being identified. Plus, being anonymous allows you to commit all sorts of social ills that are not normally permitted. Hypocrisy, for instance. I have been making fun of my blogging friends for their blogging ways, and I should really stop now that I have jumped on the blogging bandwagon, but I have no intention of stopping. I still think that this rush to post the intimate details of one's life on the internet for all the world to see is incredibly odd, the fact that I now plan to do so as well notwithstanding. Ahh... anonymous hypocrisy.

Anyway, the all-consuming issues in my life right now are stemming from trying to plan my career around my husband's military career. He left (read "dropped out") college in his senior year because he stopped going to class and figured it was stupid to keep on taking out loans to pay for classes he was not attending. And it was. He then enlisted in the navy. Right now, he's in an officer's program and going to college, courtesy of the navy, in DC. When he graduates in Dec. 2006, he will be commissioned and will then serve five more years (at least; that's what he owes the navy for college).

I am in law school in DC-about to enter my third (and last!!!!) year. He and I met when I first moved up here at a bar while he was in town checking out colleges. I had no intention of getting serious with him-it just seemed like we were from two incredibly different worlds that could never mesh with each other. But the road to hell is paved with good intentions, and get serious we did. We did the long-distance dance for months. I spent last summer with him in Norfolk while I worked for a DC firm long-distance. He went away to officer training lite in Newport, and we got married over my Christmas break just in time for us to both go back to school.
Because he's in this officer program, he's attached to an NROTC unit, which is, obviously, populated predominantly by college kids. College kids who do not have spouses. So there is no sort of spousal support structure in place. For the most part, this does not bother me; the few navy wives with whom I have come into contact did not seem like they had too much in common with me or like they were too interested in talking to me once they figured that out. But, occasionally, the lack of support and information does irk me-like last week when I discovered that dental insurance is optional for spouses... after I had already had a cleaning.

But, really, the big problem is trying to figure out how I am going to have this legal career with a husband who is committed to the navy for at least 7 more years and probably more like the next 15 years. As all of my friends are preparing to sign with firms in NY, LA, DC or wherever, I am stuck in limbo because I don't know where my husband will be stationed in a year and a half. We can request Norfolk, and I can try to plan my career like it will be Norfolk and get hired (hopefully) by a firm down there, but what happens when he gets stationed in San Diego instead?

The uncertainty is frustrating. And uncertainty is one of the signature traits of military life so I need to get used to it. For now, I am pretending like we know that he will get sent to Norfolk, and I am trying to convince firms down there that this a sure thing. I'm not really sure if they're buying it, though. My husband is convinced that if he requests it, he can get it because the navy always needs people in Norfolk and no one ever requests it. While I can see the logic in that, during my two years of exposure to the navy, I have learned that it does not adhere to logic and that what makes sense to me (or anyone not in the navy) is not an accurate indicator of what the navy will end up doing. And so, again, back to uncertainty.

Well... that was very cathartic. I promise less circular bitching in the future. Thanks for witnessing my internet debut.