Reading An Aspiring Professional Everything

Well, I've been permanently disqualified from doing my job (nuclear missile launch officer) and so I (my wife and me -- same thing) face a decision: stay where we are in the... well... rather undesirable conditions of Montana for another 1.5 years, or retrain, hope I get the job I want (Office of Special Investigations, Computer Crime Investigation), move to another base, and remain in the Air Force for at least another 2 years, probably more like two and a half.

A difference of 2 years -- particularly considering the marketability I would gain if I got my job -- doesn't sound like a big deal.  That is, it doesn't until you consider the trials and tribulations of our last two.  In that time, we've lost two of our family members, nearly lost our marriage (though we're doing wonderfully now), moved across the country twice (somehow remaining 2000 miles from home), and now live in a state with winter 11.5 out of 12 months.

I know there are those who have suffered much more deeply than we have, and I apologize if I sound like I'm whining.  We only discovered how "home body-ish" we are when we left home (really left) for the first time.  Our family is everything to us, and being so far from them with no easy access -- particularly with the losses we've already experienced -- has been horrendous.  I love the Air Force and being an officer, but not at the expense of those I love.

Now, here's the decision that, I think, we're slowly coming to.  Two years (assuming the absolute, virtually impossible worst case) is at once an eternity and a blink of the eyes -- yes, it is two more years that we can't readily put a hand on our loved ones, but it's also, well, just two years.  In that time, I will have put on Captain (and so gained a considerable salary increase to go along with the second "bar" and the new responsibility), I will have vastly expanded my depth of knowledge in computer science, and I will be prepared to enter the civilian job market with an outstanding resume', whether I join a firm or start my own as a consultant. 

The weirdest part of growing up, for me, has been coming to the realization that it really, truly is no longer and will never again be just about me, or even just about my wife and me.  We'll be adding a munchkin or three (five if you ask Sabreya) in the coming years, and we must, must consider that when making these kinds of decisions -- with the economy and job market in its current state, I have to reflect on what I'll be doing to put bread on the table and in the wife's wallet when the day comes that I hang the uniform up for the last time.

It is a strange thing, life, ain't it?  How rare is the occasion that we may simply reach out and have what we want in whole?  Very, I'd say, and so we're left to think and ponder and talk and decide, not only for our own well-being but for those in our charge.  It is not easy, and I pray for guidance in the trials to come, but I have deep faith that we'll be happy in the long run.

Here's to the future!

- John

Permalink

Posted in: Plans