Starting from Zero (fb profiling)

My vision for this Facebook page has been twenty-two years in the making, which means it's starting at zero. Initially, I will not have a single like. This is a brand new endeavor and it has the potential to push me past comfort zones that I don't even know. I may have to censor myself in an unexplored way. I'm starting a blog, I want it to reach the military community and I want it to be specific to the people that have grown up Army. If it is explored by people with no military affiliation, I am okay with that but it's directed to get military kids to feel like they belong. I want them to find comfort and I want them to be able to identify with my words on some level. I want to inspire them to write about their feelings and understand that the way they live is as unnormal as can be. There is a significant chance that military kids won't ever feel like they belong somewhere, so I want them to create one, a place they belong. Create a space where they can voice what it's actually like, how they deal with parents who go through the unthinkable.

I plan to create a Facebook page that promotes my blog and helps it reach the public and my past communities. I want to allow for a glimpse into the life of an Army kid, the perspective, the humor, the hurts, the triumphs and the way we understand our parents even. It's personalized to my perspective, my understanding, and so on. I won't argue that every military brat feels the way I do, or even could utilize this outlet, but I think that on some level someone somewhere is going to touch base with where I'm coming from. Sometimes I've ached for someone to say, yeah me too, and now that I am far away from a military community I am going to create that possibility through the internet and social networks. I don't want to lose touch with the people that have been, and always will be my family. I want to remember the stories that often get lost and unrecognized and I want to keep our struggles on the front burner because they matter.

I've had a relationship with the Army from moment zero, born on one of the largest military bases in the USA. I recognize that every bone in my body is army, and I've never even enlisted. I didn't sign my life over to the Army, I just was. Everyday has been a give and take system, army has me endure some roughage, and then propels me into something astounding. I'm the daughter of a retiree, and at that ceremony, me and the army squared up, we said alright our contract has been met. But, that is a load of bologna, I still believe I owe something to the army, and this is my way of coming through  for it cause in the end it came through for me. And still does.



Who....
Cares.....

The brand spanking new army wife
 of a private first class who has not two stinking clues about the army what in the world she is getting into. She may browse the internet for some sort of support group and pass by my page with a link to a blog about army kids. Funny, she was just talking to her soldier about when they want to start trying for kids. Secretly, she's a little nervous, one because she's heard brats are kind of trouble and she's stressing bringing a baby into the world on her pfc's salary. AH!(rightfully) She's 23 and she enjoys my young perspective and my honesty. Her husband has been in the army like a minute and she wrote and wrote him all through basic. She wants to know what it's going to be like when she has a baby in this culture. How she can answer questions that her family and friends ask her about her new life she's beginning when she is still figuring it all out herself. She may not even be aware that she is about to bring an army kid into the world one day... She's from Delaware and she's shipping out to Fort Benning, Georgia in a week, she's excited but terrified to leave the town she grew up in and planned to raise all her babies in.



The brat
the other me-s. The 19 year old kid who goes out to college in cedar Utah that doesn't realize Utah has a smaller military community and misses that feeling of support. He's hours away from a military base and his family is stationed in Heidelburg, Germany. He may want someone to know what the crap he's talking about when he says that he doesn't want to go eat at mcdonalds he would rather go chow at the DFAC, what the what? ( thats what his college roommate from sandy utah says, the dfac?) How do you explain something that was never even explained to you, it was just there. Uh, the dfac, the mess hall. thats where we get our chow on. They'll be like yeah I dunno what you mean by that sounds gross. The brat might want to hear me talk about four years ago (before the giant furloughs, when the DFAC used to do lobster and crab leg days) He may find comfort in reading an article of someone who has experienced something similar to him, for nostalgic purposes and homesick days.

The boy
who's dad died on the deployment that all our dads were on. The one that gets to see us years later via Facebook photographs going to our university football games with our dads. His dad didn't make it, and he gets to remember that everyday. Guess what? All of us remember it too, everyday, we just don't say so. He will seek my page and see me talking about it like it was yesterday proving that the occurrence, can't be forgotten because its a part of me too. He's going to feel a tie to the community that will always his family even if we all have to move on with our lives. He will get to see that I'm having a hard time with it too, he's not the only one even if my Facebook page makes it look like I'm carrying on just fine. Instead of burying deep down to pretend like it can't touch him, he might see that it's okay to talk about it, and it could be theraputic to write about it. Because instead of him bottling it up, I'd love to know what he's thinking about it. If his thoughts have changed or grown or worsened over the years.

The teenager
whose dad is gone. He's been gone a week and it all just hit her. How do you get along, "Can my dad really miss my hs graduation? How do i stay connected. How do i even know what he's really going through right now? His emails say he's fine he's tired but its great and they are progressing everyday.. "do your hw and practice the piano an extra hour this weekend" This blog might help her find humor or deep compassion for her dad, and it can help her not forget about him and the reality of the situation when sometimes you get so used to them being gone you chalk it up as a smaller deal. Don't get in the routine of, I miss him, I missed him yesterday, I'm going to miss him tomorrow so why boo hoo about it. NO. Miss him, feel it. Feel it worse on some days and feel it less on others. Miss him everyday but don't ever get used to it.