He's Moved Home Again!

This post is long overdue. I am so darned happy to write it finally too. Many of you have wondered how I spend so much time blogging. Well, you are about to find out.

First of all let me say I am a very loyal person and faithful. I work hard to be diligent in all I do. I think blogging is important for not only me but for others I talk to. I remember what it was like just beginning to blog and wondering if anyone was reading or even cared what I thought about gardening. Once the first comments came to this blog I realized, hey, some folks are actually reading!! And that made me happy. It made me feel like all my hard work was worth the time.

The more folks commented, the more I commented and talked and conversations began. From conversations friendships developed. One thing led to another and before I knew it I felt as though I knew the people I spoke to on this blog and on their own blogs.

Personalities DO come out in blogs. I have had the pleasure of meeting several bloggers not only in Tennessee, but from as far away as Florida, Georgia, Maine, and Ohio. Blogging changed a bit further for me because not only did I have relationships with people on this blog, but I also got to know them outside of the blog.

Whenever I speak to someone on here it is as though I speak to them in person. I know it is not always the same on the Internet as in person, but one single point remains-you do develop relationships (and hopefully friendships) with folks on blogs, not all, but some for sure. It takes two way conversation in addition to having common interests. Hence, comments and 'talking' are a big part of this blog.

Once these relationships developed, a commitment came about that I placed upon myself. I really want to talk to all my friends on here and do so by commenting on their blogs as well as this one. More and more folks began commenting and I began knowing more and more people which took more and more time. Wow! Lots of time!

I enjoy the social interaction, the learning, and all the tours to other gardens I may not ever have seen otherwise. I've learned so much and gained so much more than I ever expected when I first began blogging nearly two years ago. But again, anyone who blogs knows blogging takes time and a commitment. I've already explained my commitment thing, now onto the time.

Where do I get the time? I am very efficient and have a system but mainly the big reason I have time to blog is because my husband (Mr. Fix-it, aka Roger) lives in another state! Yes, it is true. He has lived in Indiana since August of 2005, but now his tour of duty in Evansville Indiana has come to an end and he has moved back home!!!

Let me explain lest anyone get the wrong idea-Lola-no panics now:)) Regular readers know my husband is a recruiter. He is an Army recruiter; a very important job as we all know. Without recruiters there might not be an all volunteer Army. As much maligned as recruiters are, I can honestly say from my experience in the Army, recruiters are the hardest working men and women in the Army! My husband would much rather suffer the hardships in Iraq (he's been already) or Afghanistan than serve even one more day in recruiting. Recruiting is tough, but Mr. Fix-it is a professional and had a job to do, so he did it, and did it well.

In November 2004 we were notified by the Department of the Army that Mr. Fix-it was selected for recruiting duty. Normally, recruiters selected for this type of duty are required to serve for three years. Sometimes recruiters don't even make it one year due to the grueling hours and tough sales experience it requires of the men and women. Mr. Fix-it was due to attend recruiting school in Fort Jackson, South Carolina, then he would report to his recruiting station in August 2005. Fine. Fair enough. Three years is not so long really. This is part of Army life and we accepted it completely, all the while hoping his recruiting duty would see him here close to home-preferably in Clarksville.

Alas, it was not to be. Mr. Fix-it was assigned to the Indianapolis Recruiting Battalion, with duty in Evansville, Indiana. His last duty station in this company saw him recruiting soldiers in Jasper, Indiana; while the company headquarters is located in Bloomington. This is a hard tour for regular Army soldiers (think lots of driving and oh yes, let's throw in a time difference because Indiana is one of those states that-well, let's just say there are two time zones!) because of the unavailability of normal Army logistics and because of working totally in the civilian world. Civilians have a totally different mentality than Army folks, or even folks in a city around an Army town. At any rate, Mr. Fix-it has been tremendously successful in his job of recruiting. He earned one of the Army's highest recruiting awards, the gold Recruiter ring. I am SO proud of him and even posted about it here. He may consider it more of a war trophy, but I am ecstatic he earned it!! So he gave it to me. Ha! Funny guy huh?

Recruiting soldiers in a time of war is pretty difficult. While I love the folks in southern Indiana, they are very anti Army when it comes to their kids serving in the Army. I kind of don't blame them. The Army certainly comes with risks, but so does every day life; there are no guarantees. I have two daughters who have served in the Army (one is in right now) so I talk from an experienced point of view. There is nothing wrong with wanting your son or daughter close to home, but if that son or daughter wishes to join the military-then the parent should be supportive and not hate the recruiter. 'Nuff said on this issue. Just know recruiters have a tough job.

Recruiting saw Mr. Fix-it working 60-80 hour workweeks. All hours of every day of the week were fair game. He has received phone calls on his Army issued cell phone at 2 am while on vacation, to 10 am on Christmas day. Yes, such is the life. All part of the job I guess, but not so conducive to family life. As such, we made the difficult decision to maintain two separate households while Mr. Fix-it was a recruiter. Logically, living apart in order to maintain our home and life here in Tennessee made sense to us. Not only were there long hours to contend with (think NO family dinners due to work commitments), there was the issue of Jimmy and his school. Selling or renting our Tennessee home was not an option. Living apart and purchasing a 'temporary' home was the only route we could go. Mr. Fix-it could concentrate on his very important recruiting duties while in Evansville, and then he could focus on family when the time was right-mainly weekends.

Evansville is a short two hour drive from our home in Tennessee. Either the Jimster and I drove up to Evansville (with all dogs in tow) or Mr. Fix-it drove down to Tennessee every single weekend. By the time 2008 came around we were getting excited about Mr. Fix-it's tour of duty coming to an end. It HAD been three years! A quick email to the Department of the Army asking when he would receive his next assignment and could it be Fort Campbell brought us a BIG shock. Mr. Fix-it was extended for an extra nine months. Instead of his tour of duty ending in August 2008 as it should have, it was now scheduled to end the following April (now May).

I must say somewhere along the way the Army Recruiting Command changed its procedures for operations. Instead of working unGodly hours and beating up their 'salesmen' each day, they switched to a 'team concept'. This concept allowed the recruiters some more time off and took off a lot of pressure. Also, about this time the economy began tanking and guess what? The Army began getting lots of men and women who all of a sudden wanted to join the Army. And, the folks who are currently in the Army, want to stay! The Army now found itself in a good position and is actually shortening some recruiter's tours, not Mr. Fix-it's though, but he is done nonetheless!

I started this blog in the fall of 2007; which was about one year prior to Mr. Fix-it being scheduled to come home. I had plenty of time to blog since he lived elsewhere. Jimmy and I do our own thing so I had lots of flexibility (think plenty of frozen dinners whenever I was done gardening or blogging or whatever). We saw hubby on the weekends, vacations, and special occasions such as Army sponsored trips to Great Wolf Lodge and the Sheraton in Indianapolis (boy was that cool!), and we spoke to each other each and every day; without fail. Time moved on and before we knew it the tour of duty ended. Mr. Fix-it has been reassigned to Fort Campbell so he has moved back in!!!

This is such a wonderful thing for us all and we are very happy to have him home. He's been living here now for a few weeks and we have needed no adjustment to our schedules-except one. He goes to sleep with the television on. This is not my thing so he says for me to stay up and blog. Yup! Go figure! By the time I go to bed the television is off and all is well. We've adjusted well and at that is awesome! Jimmy is very happy to have his Dad home now.

What does this mean for my blogging? We shall see. I am going to have to re-prioritize without doubt. I will always blog as I learn so much and enjoy the interaction, but I may not be as diligent as I have always been. I don't think that will be an issue for my blogging friends BUT it is an issue for me. I have to get over it though because things will change for me somewhat. I simply will not want to be on here as much as I was prior to Mr. Fix-it coming home. I have established a pattern and habits that will be hard for me to change, but change they will. There is so much to be done around the house-and I am not even talking the garden. I am not exactly sure how things will pan out with blogging, perhaps I may not post as often. Or perhaps I may not comment as often, I just don't know. I do plan to keep my standard day postings for sure. As far as other posts I have about 50 in the hopper still and more come every single day. Posts that are important for me to share (in my opinion) but maybe not so important at all in the big picture of things may just sit in the hopper and never be posted. Preparing posts takes time, as does visiting and commenting and so on. We shall see how I can balance it all but I can see I will be without a doubt spending less time blogging, though he's been home for two weeks now and I've only slightly slowed down, so we'll see. For now I plan to do like I always try to do and take it one day at a time....

in the garden....

P.S. Mother's Day saw us in Evansville finally moving the last of the furniture down here to Tennessee. Fortunately it didn't rain too hard on our uncovered trailer-so much for weather reports!

I did get in a short garden visit to my friend's house with the lovely irises. She of course, shared some more with me. I will always remember Mr. Fix-it's days in Evansville as days of good shopping, beautiful plants and outdoor things, and nice folks.

I hope we can still visit often and sell our house soon! Wish us luck as the economy is so bad there that we may be lucky to sell our house for what we paid for it four years ago! Not a happy day for us at all.

P.P.S. Sorry such a long post-but you all know me! Feel free to skip over it quickly!! But now you know how I got into blogging and how I have been able to spend so much time on here. It has all been a joy, and good thing Mr. Fix-it is such a good guy to understand.

I made the sign in the picture above back in 2004 when Roger returned from a one year deployment to Iraq. Little did I know I would have a reason to use it again.

in the garden....working very hard lately.