What a wild ride January is each year. It’s simultaneously the longest month (or seemingly so) and the hardest month to navigate – especially here in interior Alaska. In Fairbanks, January and February are often the coldest months of the year, and while we’ve had very mild temperatures thus far this winter, it looks like that may shift next week. The real elephant in the room though? We’re in the thick of the waiting game right now; the Army’s personal little hellscape that all military families endure at one time or another.

Army Life + The Waiting Game

Someone once told me that when we’re on the other side of this whole military game and we actually get to make decisions for ourselves, we’ll understand how absolutely wild this lifestyle is. I’m sure they’re right. In any other walk of life, if you were planning to move in about six months, you would have everything lined up. You’d have a solid gameplan. You’d know where you’re going, when you’re going, who’s helping you get there…all of it.

For us though? We move in about six months. We don’t know where we’re going. We know when we’re going. We don’t know anything about how the process looks. This isn’t our first rodeo. We’ve moved from Huachuca to Fort Drum, to JBLM, to Camp Humphreys, to Fort Wainwright. You’d think I’d be good at the waiting game by now, but I’m not.

Enjoying the Present While Preparing for the Future

It’s honestly such a weird spot to be in emotionally. We’re doing our best to enjoy the present and soak it all up while we’re simultaneously trying to prepare for the somewhat imminent future that may or may not be set in stone. Because, honestly, while we’ve heard where we may be going, we don’t know for sure. Everything is up in the air until you get that notification.

For someone super type-A (or micromanage-y) like myself, relinquishing that control is hard, and I’ve been up poor Ryan’s butt for weeks now hoping for those orders because, historically speaking, we usually know by around this time. So, I’m impatiently trying to prepare for something we don’t know about, which is wild. In any other walk of life, this would be madness.

The Silver Lining of it All

Ultimately, this is our last PCS. Ryan has under four years to go left in the military, and if you ask him, he’ll tell you the exact year, months, and days left. This is it. Retirement is on the horizon, and that’s equally wild. And, for better or worse, the waiting game will end. It’s not really the timeframe I’d like it to end in, and I’m perpetually disgruntled right now, but we’re grateful for the time we still have with our people here in Alaska.

At the end of the day, we’ll close this chapter here, as well, and we’ll move on. That’s the nature of military life. Till then though…we’ll just keep trucking our way through our final Alaskan winter and cross our fingers for orders soon.