The young woman (age 28 or so) who is the fitness director at the YMCA I attend will say good-bye to her husband tomorrow. He is an army engineer and is being sent to Iraq for the next 18 months.
They have a 2-year-old daughter and a 6-month-old son.
She’s fortunate in that she has a job with flexible hours and family-friendly policies; she’s been able to bring her children to work while nursing, for example. She’s fortunate that her job floods her with endorphins and keeps her in shape--in shape enough to run marathons, compete in triathalons, etc. (The new, new momism, if you ask me, is this macho-attitude when it comes to giving birth and whipping one’s body back into shape in three weeks, but that’s another post, and granted, fitness is her career). She’s fortunate that she has lots of family in the area for support.
Still, she’s going to be a single, working mom for essentially the next two years. She’s tough, physically, but emotionally, it’s going to be rough on her, to think that her son will be practically two before his dad returns, if his dad returns.
This is as close as the war in Iraq has hit me. One would like to be supportive, to support a soldier’s wife, if not the war effort, but it’s hard to help people, isn’t it? You have to trust them to be equal to their fate.
10:41:26 PM 
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