200 Miles From Home

200 Miles From Home

I was born on December 3^rd in 1981 in a small hospital in San Antonio. My mother has no middle name. My father came from Seattle. I live in Houston now, roughly 200 miles from my place of birth. 200 miles doesn't seem that far. If you average it, I've moved less than 10 miles every year. 2.4 miles seemed like a lot more to me before, especially when falling. The farthest distance for me was the 4 to 6 seconds of free fall after stumbling out of an aircraft. That's the point in time where I really hope all my gear works, or else the next 12,000 feet will be the last that I travel. There's no place farther from home than those 12,000 feet.

I signed my paperwork to go into the Army on December 20^th in 2000. It was the day I met my future wife. Thanks fate. I'm not saying that if I had met her the day before I wouldn't have signed the contract that would take me through 2 wars, a concussion, multiple bodily injuries, 4 cars, 2 universities, 26 jumps, and 5 years of my life, but sometimes I wonder if I would have. It's hard to describe that period of time succinctly: hard, fun, slow, boring, fast, scary, or lonely? What stories can I tell quickly? The one where I saw a man drink his own urine for seven dollars? Driving through Kuwait in a caravan when death from IED's was at its highest rate? Pleading with my wife not to leave me? Hearing the people around me in Iraq going through the same trial and tribulations? Or what it feels like to hit the ground in high winds? Like I said, it's hard to describe succinctly.

Or do I talk about my life before the army? I loved high school. I know most of my generation would not say, "Those were the best days of my life." But I loved it. I didn't take anything seriously except music and computers. I played tenor, bari, and alto saxophone in multiple bands and ensembles. I played anchor base for our indoor and outdoor drum line. When I had time to spare, I'd pick up a set of mallets and blast away at the marimba, tenor drums, or just a snare drum. I became good enough at percussion that I would sometimes be mistaken for our drum line captain. That was my wife's first impression of me – me picking up the base guitar she was trying to learn for the garage band she was in. When she asked me how long I'd been playing, truthfully I answered, "I think I picked one up a year ago, but that's about it." And that was life before the Army.

Should I then talk about life after the army? My wife and I lived in apartments in San Antonio. I subcontracted for the Army under a company I hated and a boss who resembled more of a belligerent platypus than a human. My wife worked odd hours in a trauma ICU that was emotionally and physically draining. We didn't like it. We didn't talk. We didn't have time to We loved each other, but hated the situation. So we came home to Houston and we were happy.

About a year after we got here, and we were truly settled, she started feeling "off" one weekend. She was hungry but not hungry, nauseated at the smell of a hamburger. That Sunday morning she took a pregnancy test. Before she even set the stick down, the little cross telling us of our impending son was bright in a little bubble. I wasn't in the room with her. It was 4:30 in the morning. She came back to bed. I said, "So?" She said, "Well, I'm pregnant." I held her and whispered, "Thank you."

He's now 6 months old. He was born July 3^rd in 2009. He weighed 6 pounds and 9 ounces. I didn't know a human could be so small. I still can't; he's almost tripled in weight. We're still happy – sleep deprived, but happy. He started trying to stand with help at the age of 2 months, locking his knees so you couldn't do anything but stand him up. My and my wife's eyes are green. His eyes are a clear blue, and they are beautiful.

When I am with my family, I am home. I live 200 miles from where I was born, but the farthest I travel from home now is the distance to school.