This month we reached the halfway mark of deployment four. I swear, if I hear one more person say, “Well, that went fast!” I may be moved to violence. It has not gone fast. It has been five months (today) of excruciating and aching loneliness and I swear time has slowed down every single movement of the second hand just to thwart me. 

Okay, not really. Truth is, time is relative, right? To those who carry on life around me, the last five months may have gone quickly. Ask the spouse whose husband leaves for deployment this month, and I’m sure she’ll tell you this time simply slipped away. For those in the middle of their dwell time, maybe this time passed like that word we all covet, “normally.” But, for those of us lingering in a perpetual cycle of wait, time is a fickle little creature. 

When I look back at what’s happened these last five months, the inches the kids have grown, the work I’ve done with my career, the little hurdles we tackle as part of everyday life, I can easily agree that it seems it’s gone as quickly as possible. As senseless as it sounds, the weeks are passing by quickly, but the days are what seem to drag on and on. 

Hockey season has started, Boy Scout meetings are back in full swing, and the school year is devouring the weeks up. But there’s something about these silent moments that creep up on me - the ones where I swear the clock is stopping just to show me that it can. These moments where I miss him so much that I’m really not sure I can breathe. Yeah, those are the killer ones. 

We’re over halfway done. This is the downhill part, at least that’s what people keep saying. But without a mid-tour visit, that little shining spot of bliss, it seems like we’re perpetually climbing up this hill. Hitting the halfway mark proves that time is passing, but I can’t help but feel like it’s also a blast in my face, to say, “hey, you know these last insanely cruddy months?  Yeah, let’s do that all over again!”  There’s an incredibly childish part of me that wants to stomp my foot and shout, “No.  I don't want to!"

But come on, it’s not like we really have that option as spouses.

So yes, we’re halfway done and I’m tired. I forget what it’s like to sleep next to him. I forget what it’s like not to be the only parent handling, well, everything. I miss him in a way that words can’t define, but halfway means we’re halfway closer to him coming home. 

This is the hard part, where we’ve gone so far and still have so far to go, but now that portion of the pie gets smaller and smaller. The days will pass, the clock will move, I hope, and he will come home. This new half will be different because we’re already in the swing of things, already pushing through, and instead of reeling from his departure, we’ll be prepping for his homecoming. 

Halfway done and halfway there. 

Follow Rebecca at http://theonlygirlamongboys.blogspot.com/