June 18. Word of the Day: Support.

      Well, I haven't had a chance to write anything within the past couple of weeks. Since my last entry I have packed, cleaned, and moved out of our apartment in California and driven to Michigan. My mother in-law flew out to California and helped me clean and pack, then she drove back here with me. Many people were taken back by this, but we had a great time. I invited her to come along because I knew she would drive safe and have a good time! Anthony has really married his mother. Anyway, I've been back in Michigan for about five days now. It feels like I am visiting because I have been sleeping on couches and all of my clothes are in totes in the trunk of my car. Its weird. 

      Anthony has been deployed for nearly a month. He doesn't exactly love it in Japan, but it is better than Afghanistan! I think he slightly wishes he were at war instead of doing a training MEU. This time is way different than the last. I have not sent him any packages because he can purchase basically everything that he needs or wants. I have sent him a couple postcards but no letters. We have Skyped once or twice and we talk on Facebook messenger almost daily. It really doesn't even seem like he is deployed. He is currently upset with me because I missed a Skype date. I feel extremely bad for missing it, but I definitely did not miss it on purpose. It makes me really upset that he is treating me like I ditched him. I try my hardest to be understanding about everything he does and says because deployment causes a lot of stress on both him and I. I would rather not argue when we only get to talk a little bit. I also try not to be a push-over though too because I don't want him to get used to that. Deployment definitely pulls on strings that you didn't even know were there before. 

     I have moved home for the next two years. I am going to complete my bachelors while Anthony is still in the Marine Corps. He has two years left until he can re-enlist or get out. If he chooses to get out I would like to have a degree under my belt so I can find a good job/career to support us while he is figuring out what he wants to do. A lot of people have given me grief for moving back to Michigan to go to school. I try to ignore them, but boy is it difficult. When Anthony and I are around each other, we have no motivation. I know that sounds totally ridiculous, but it is 110% true. If I were to go to school in California, I wouldn't have the motivation to get a quality education. And, I have always wanted to graduate from Western Michigan University. It is a dream of mine. Anthony is upset that I have moved home to go back to school. He is trying to be supportive of my dream, because I have been supportive of his, but it is turning out to be slightly more difficult than he thought. The next two years of our life together is going to be interesting. We are going to have to be stronger than people think we are. We are going to have to love each other through the rough and into the smooth. 

    Supporting each other has been one of the hardest things for us to learn to do. I was so against the  idea of Anthony joining the Marine Corps when we first got together. He hated who I was when I was at Western for the first year. Yet, somehow we grew past all of that and we made things work. I have supported him throughout the past 3 years of him being a Marine. He has supported me in my complicated journey through college. We have grown up a lot since we first met. There are times that we have had a hard time being positive, but we've done it. We have climbed the mountains together and created a marriage that is much more than we expected. The love we have is different, but we've always known that. If we can continue to be supportive and loving throughout the next two years, everything will be just fine. 

I'm confident!

May 23. Word of the day: Year.

I plan to start blogging either daily or a couple days a week. I have not ever blogged before so I am excited to see how this impacts my life. I used to write all the time when I was in high school, but for some reason I stopped and just recently I have found myself missing it. So, here goes nothing. This time last year I was just settling in here in California. My husband and I had moved here from Michigan. He is in the Marine Corps so in all actuality he had been out here for about 2 years before I made the move. We got married on April 20th of last year. It is weird to think that we have been married for just over a year and I have been thousands of miles away from my family and friends for a year. This past year has been one of the hardest, yet rewarding of my entire 21 years of life.

A little back story about my husband and I... Anthony was a junior when I was a senior in high school. We met in a forensics class in 2009. He was the slacker kid that always had headphones in his ears. He had long, dark, perfect spiral curly hair, light brown skin, dark brown eyes, perfect kissing lips and his clothes never fit too tight. I was not popular, but I knew everyone in the small school that we went to and I had many friends from all the different cliques. He was definitely not what my friends would have expected me to talk to, let alone date. One day in class we were told to pick partners for a duo. We had to pick someone we had not worked with before. Anthony pointed to me and cocked his head to the side. I already had a partner, so I told him I'd be his partner next time. And that was the end of it.

I went a couple weeks without talking to him. Over those couple weeks I found myself observing him in the hall, in class, after class, etc. I would find myself trying to find him in all the chaos after the last bell of the day rung. I didn't tell anyone I was secretly attracted to him. I was in the drama club with his best friend, so one day I decided to ask for Anthony's number. His friend told me not to call him because he's an asshole. I brushed it off and took the number anyway. Earlier that day Anthony and I had decided to be partners for the upcoming duos in class, so I tried to talk myself into thinking that it was purely for practice reasons. But deep down I had to talk to him. I had to. So, after school I called. I let it ring and ring, nobody answered so I hung up. A little relieved that nobody answered I finally took a breath. Then my phone rang. It was Anthony. Long story short, we talked all night...every night for at least a month. We were together before and after school. Lips locked and holding hands almost the entire time. This boy was irresistible.

We have been together ever since. We have had some rough times but...for the most part we have been together. So anyway, this entire past year has been the wildest ride in our relationship. We have been thousands of miles away from our family. I didn't have any friends here until last November and he only has work friends... so to say the least it has been interesting. I cannot express enough how much I love my husband. He has taught me so much about how to care for someone more than you care about yourself. He has given me the opportunity to be a more loving person in more ways than one. I am grateful for this. I am grateful for him.

For the majority of the next year in our marriage he will be deployed. Then for the next year and a half after that I will be finishing my bachelors in Michigan and he will still be in California. The next years will be hard for us but I have faith that we are strong enough to conquer this mountain. I will continue tomorrow. -Victoria