The Stress of Army Life

With Dan's new job, they plan assignments 1-2 years out.  For instance, we know we are leaving here next summer to move to Washington, DC so Dan can go to school and get his masters.  We were told we'd get the follow-on list (summer 2014) in February.  We got it Thursday!  We aren't super thrilled about anywhere on the list.  Our choices are back to Aberdeen Proving Ground (my top pick, Dan says NO WAY, he has had enough of that command), Ft. Belvoir or Bolling Air Force Base in DC (traffic, commuting yuck), Charlottesville, VA (there's no base there, it's an intelligence job so we'd be away from our normal military support, not to mention the commissary and exchange) and Kirtland Air Force Base in Albequerque, NM (so far from home and totally difference from anywhere we've ever lived).  We are in the researching stage.  Dan will turn in his list early next week and then maybe by October or November we'll know where we are moving in about 20 months.  Would you keep us in your prayers?  Ultimately, God's got it all planned out.  We'll move where we are supposed to move; I just hate this portion of the process (along with the good-byes, packing, unpacking and starting over)!

***Update***

Dan turned in his list

1&2 Charlottesville, VA jobs. 
3 Kirtland AFB Albequerque, NM
4 Ft. Meade between DC and Baltimore
5 Aberdeen Proving Ground MD

We'll find out in November...torture as we wait.

Blah...Ewwwww....Harump

Its been a rough few days. Neither Kelly or myself are thrilled about the possibility / probability of heading to FT Leonard Wood. I do not have orders yet, and there are still some wickets that must take place before it is final, so keep us in your thoughts as we continue the process. Dan again.

Where Are the Woods of Misery, You Ask

Either you got my last post or you really didn't.  So for those that didn't, here is the explanation....

We were given a list of available jobs.  I naively researched houses and schools in 3 of the areas and was really excited about all of them.  There were 12 new 52s and 15 slots and as the Army tends to do, they don't really care what you want.  I don't quite understand why they even gave us the whole list and let us dream.  It was really mean.  You see, there's a new job in Lost in the Woods of Misery and the biggest requirement is that the person comes from the 20th.  Encase you are wondering, Dan has worked at the 20th Support Command for the last 4 years.  There are no other new 52s from here; so with your powers of deduction, you can guess who is getting the crappiest job on the list.  Well, maybe the job isn't going to be crappy, but the area sure is.

If you google Lost in the Woods of Misery, you'll get a map that looks something like this...

 and if you zoom in, like this...

The other nickname for Ft. Leonard Wood, MO is the "other" armpit of the Army.  The first being Ft. Polk, LA.  I can't even begin to explain to you how not excited I am about this.  This is such a horrible place, that instead of the 3 year typical assignment, the branch guy has promised to only keep us there 2 years and he says Dan can have his choice of schools or assignments leaving there.  I don't believe anything anyone in the Army says.

Ft. Leonard Wood is in the middle of no where.  There's just the base.  The area is depressed.  The population has decreased by over half in the last 30 years.  There are a couple schools that look only OK.  I'm discouraged and depressed.  The housing reminds me of what we lived in at Ft. Lee and we don't want to repeat that, but it looks like the OK schools are on the base.  It's a lose/lose.  The nearest towns are Springfield (an hour and a half) and St. Louis (two and a half hours).  I've been googling things around the base.  There is a Lowe's and a Super Walmart.  Target is 50 miles away.  When I typed Kohl's, a store called "Ruthy's Variety Shop" popped up.  So not encouraging.

I've been searching online for an article, blog or anything where someone has something positive to say about living at Ft. Leonard Wood.  I haven't found a single positive thing.  The common nick-name pretty much says it all.  Dan found one message board comment that said there's a large outlet mall an hour away (that was the only positive the person could come up with and they didn't actually live there) and honestly, that's not a positive when I live where I do now.  I can get to just about every major chain store within 5-20 minutes from my house.  The UPS man and I are going to have quite the relationship because all of my purchasing will be done online just like when we lived in Germany.  Speaking of Germany, I'd actually rather go back there for three years than go to Missouri for two.

Dan's unhappy with my tears and negative attitude, but he doesn't get that I really need to get it out (the 5 stages of grief and all) so I can hit acceptance and "buck up" to be a good little Army wife.  Right now, my gut instinct is to be a horrible Army wife and pack me and the kids up and head to my Mama's house or maybe not pack at all and stay here for two years.  I'm just kidding about that, but the thought has crossed my mind.

So there you have it.  We'll move sometime this summer.  We have to sell our house and Dan has a 3 week course he has to go to.  He also has a 15 week course, but he's going to wait until we are leaving Misery so I don't have to sell a house, pack a house, move 3 kids and a cat halfway across the country and find and move into a new house by myself.

Dan the 52 Man

We've been talking a lot about Dan's military future and what direction his careers needs to take.  In October, he applied to switch jobs within the Army.  I hope I explain this right.  Right now, he's EOD (explosive ordnance disposal), but as he makes rank, it's harder to get EOD jobs.  The organization is bottom heavy where there are more junior officers and less senior officers.  He applied to switch to FA-52 which is a nuclear counter-proliferation officer (I hope I got that title right).  52 is top heavy so there will be room for growth and advancement to Lt. Colonel.  The board met in December to review the applications.  Two weeks ago, the 52 assignments guy was here at Aberdeen and wanted to meet with Dan to talk assignments even though the list hadn't been published.  That made us pretty positive he was on the list, but we needed to see the real list.  We were told the list would be published last week, but all Dan got was an email with a non-working link to the list along with a date the link would be active.  The Army is mean, I tell.  Tuesday morning, Dan checked and he is on the list!  This is something he really wanted and I'm very proud of him.  Our next step was to look at available assignments and submit a wish list.  We played the hurry up and wait ranking game and now we are waiting to find out where the Army is going to send us.