Life After Year Three
Be Careful What You Ask for in Friendships.
I married a military officer not knowing what I was getting into. I was blissfully ignorant and in love. He had told me we would be moving a lot. I told him I loved traveling so that was ok. I quickly found out traveling and moving are two different things. I hated both of them until about year thirteen. Then moving became like clockwork. It was a chance to restart, to reinvent yourself again, it was fun. The moment things got familiar and boring, we were on a new adventure: new city, country, friends, house, school, and work.
In the Air Force, it is the their job to expose officers to a breath of knowledge. Depending on the mission of the air base, officers were required to understand each mission. For example, when we were at the Pentagon the mission was procuring resources to make strategic decisions for the entire Air Force. In Alabama, it was educating officers for senior leadership in Louisiana, it was providing nuclear and strategic bombing capabilities all around the world. Japan, it was controlling and accessing air power to the entire Pacific. Germany, it was defending US interests across the Middle East, Africa and Europe. In 20 years, we moved 13 times. On average, that was 2–3 years per location.
After our last tour in Europe, my husband retired as a Colonel at twenty-four years. We moved to a city where no one in the military would move to: San Francisco. California probably would be the last place any military family would want to move to for many reasons: high housing prices, high living costs, wildfires, high California taxes, homelessness, traffic, etc. many officers retiring in their mid 40’s usually take on a second career typically as a contractor for the AF. These companies are not in California. So how did we end up in San Francisco? We wanted to finally be rooted in a community of friends. We had some friends in SF that we wanted to do life with, a luxury we didn’t have for 20 years. Finally, the AF didn’t tell us where to go.
The housing market in Bay area is nothing like you ever seen. We bought a home sight unseen. Unless you have the luxury to fly to SF and put an all-cash offer, as an out of town buyer, you have to buy it without any contingencies or you won’t be able to compete. My blind friend found our home and described it to us through touch and feel. Whenever I tell this story, people laugh, and I didn’t realize how funny it sounded because I trust my friend instinctively. I joke about it now.
It was a miracle: we bought our San Francisco home all the way across the Atlantic in Germany. We were ready to put down roots and call our forever home San Francisco. I was so excited to live in the most beautiful city in USA. Transitioning back to United States was hard at first. We weren’t used to it. It took about a year to settle in. Then everything seemed normal, everything seemed almost too perfect. Our kids were enrolled in school, they made fast friends at church, we reconnected with our old friends and made new ones. However after year three, we started to have conflicts with people. My neighbor would tell me my dog is barking too much, and kids were falling behind in school. My daughter got into conflicts with her friends. My son was bullied at his school. I started to have this sinking feeling.. I wanted to move. I wanted to retreat. Then it hit me, I never stayed anywhere beyond year three. I wasn’t used to people getting close to us, I wasn’t used to the criticism and conflict because I never stayed too long to have them. I wasn’t used to feedback.
During Covid, we moved again to be close to our community of friends and church (about 20–30 minutes away). This was year three for us. I definitely had the itch: to move, to change, to start over again. My kids were also feeling it as well. I justified the move because after all we were now going to be living in the same area as where our friends were living anyway, and I was ready to get closer to my friends and meet new ones.
That was a year ago, and I love where we are now, but we are going through a painful period again of doing life with people. They get to peek into my life, and I have the privilege to peek into their lives as well. I can’t pretend my life is all put together in front of them and that’s ok. I want to retreat and hide when I’m tired or cranky. I want to put up walls because this is exactly what I do when people get too close to me, but I’m fighting it everyday. When my neighbors tell me my dog is barking too much for the fourth time, I try to break the ice and invite them over for dinner. I bring them cookies. I don’t want them to not like me because my dog keeps barking.
Being committed to a community around you is getting real with people: sharing, helping, serving, caring and loving them. Without roots there’s no growth or depth. Just like a plant, it can’t grow without getting deeper. This is the same with people. We need to dig to get deeper so our roots will spread and grow.
Our roots before were shallow and superficial. We bounced around from city to city, country to country. It was a transient military community that didn’t have a chance to grow deeper, and that was okay. Now we are putting down our roots in a civilian society. It’s not easy when I see flaws in my friends, and when I judge my neighbor for being so ornery because my dog is barking. But when you are able to get through a conflict together, and still love people with their faults and all, your relationships deepen, and there is greater joy than you ever imagined because of the bond of friendship and community.
I’m still on this journey. I’ll let you know where I end up in couple years.
