You know what sucks???

...when you are deployed to the Middle East, and you are worrying about back home. You worry about here, about home, they worry about your being here, about what's going on there, etc. But at home, no one is carrying a gun around them besides the police. No one is talking about Explosive Formed Projectiles, Vehicle-borne Improved Explosive Devices, or that type of thing.

I know somewhere out there, someone hears "go out there and kick some ass, we'll be fine at home," or concentrate on what you have to do so you don't screw it up," or some other kind of motivation from home, but that's not what the people around me are getting. They hear whining and bitching from girlfriends how hard they have it teaching kindergarten, how tough their "weekend" was (I forgot what a weekend was a while ago), how they have to take care of the kids, how stressful it is in grad school, or how rough their work-week was, etc. Some of it borders on ridiculous considering our present location and situation. Why so many Americans need so much emotional support is also ridiculous. Are we overly-praised, overly pampered, and narcissistic? Probably.

Part of me understands what happens, especially if there is a leader in the family that's away. Another part of me, however, considers it an ego thing. Women (and generals) are by and large overly concerned about themselves, regardless of their awareness of that fact. Take for example, my ex wife. She is apparently taking this opportunity to make sure I have almost no contact with my son, who lives with her. What does that do? Puts mental stress on me. She is guilty of having to be praised at every moment of the day or else she risks feeling unappreciated, and non-validated. She apparently has another new boyfriend (I should say another new temporary boyfriend) who hasn't tired of her bullshit or poor sexual performance yet. It looks like she's taking the time to involve my son in that relationship so that she can make herself feel good about herself somehow, so contact with me is something she sees as a bother or something my son doesn't need. If I stopped the child support, she'd suddenly get real interested in contacting me. But enough about me.

I have soldiers with parents and grandparents in the hospital, wives having children, one kid in the hospital, one guy in the middle of a divorce when he left, and they spend as much time worrying about that as they do what they're mission is over here. Problem is, they have that luxury, since none of them are carrying guns through the streets of Baghdad, but taking their eye off the ball can interrupt support to those carrying guns in the streets, and that's a bad thing.