Permanent Change of Station

The Personal Reinvention – New Goals and Pursuits in my New Temporary Home

ValerieLeave a comment
Kanoehe, Hawai'i
Ho’omaluhia Botanical Garden, Aug 2016

 

The biggest opportunity of moving is the chance for personal reinvention.

Who do I want to be? What do I want to do?

Last year, with my limited time in Alabama, I focused on three areas:

  1. Fitness outside my comfort zone – Irontribe Fitness. Spartan Race.
  2. Volunteering.
  3. License Re-certification – I returned to school to acquire additional required hours to recertify my massage therapy license (Don’t let your licenses expire. Ever!).  I now have a current massage therapist license for the State of Alabama, which unfortunately doesn’t transfer to the State of Hawai’i.

This year, I intend to focus on…

  1. Playing Tourist in Paradise!
  2. Yoga.
  3. Massage Therapy License.
  4. Writing & reading.
  5. Last minute add – get over my fear of becoming an ocean creature’s snack!

My personal reinvention is concurrent with…

  1. Easing this transition for my children.
  2. Unpacking & purging.
  3. Establishing routine & schedule. (Never-ending cycle of domestic bliss!)
  4. Dating my hubby.
  5. Building Community.
  6. Making & sustaining friendships.

All of this takes time.  Sweet, sweet time.

I am open to new places and faces while presenting the best, and more importantly, the REAL version of myself.  This takes a lot of energy but with this move, I have a lot of less expectations about how life should look like and how quickly I should establish said life.  Thus, I have a lot less angst than with past moves.  Is it burnout or wisdom? Or is it the beautiful, calming aloha spirit?

Whatever it is, It’s my fresh start and I’m ready.

What are you focusing on for your personal reinvention in your new home?

Valerie

I Have Laundry Duty even in Paradise

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One month of hotel living:  Bag drag of seven suitcases through five hotels, three states, one long day of air travel.

Our family of four brought six suitcases and a booster seat for 2 to 3 months of living minimally until we are reunited with our household goods (hopefully).

After 30+ days, I have loads of laundry to do of the same tired wardrobe.

Hotel laundry facilities are not created equal. The first hotel charged $7.50 a load (!). Our current hotel charges $3.00 a load.  The 3 washers & 3 dryers are in high demand.

My forever friend Sylvia texts me: “I thought that in Paradise you just toss your beautiful flowing garments into the ebb of the magical waves and they flowed back to you on an ocean breeze.” (Quite the wit, she is!)

This is my reality right now:

Laundry duty in paradise
Laundry duty in paradise

 

Lessons learned:

  1. Never take more than you can carry.
  2. Wheeled luggage is essential.
  3. Make sure your family of 4 plus ALL your luggage fit in your rental car! (It’s a very tight squeeze for us!)
  4. Remember living on top of each other in 400 s.f. is only temporary.

Aloha!

Valerie

Aloha…Life is Good in Hawaii

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I am was in the middle of a chaotic, logistically challenging move to Hawaii, and I just don’t remember previous moves being this stressful.

HOWEVER,  This is my current view…

Our view of Waikiki Beach, Honolulu, Hawaii
Our view of Waikiki Beach, Honolulu, Hawaii

 

I operate with these thoughts/guidelines/procedures when it comes to moving:

  1.  If it can go wrong, it will.  * Murphy’s Law always makes an appearance. ALWAYS.*
  1. Hurry up & wait.
  1. Accept that It just won’t make much sense when it comes to military policy & procedures.
  1. Agencies & their agents don’t care about you, your move, your stuff. “It’s not my problem.”

We received orders 35 days before his Report No Later Than Date (RNLTD) for an overseas move.  The Transportation Management Office (TMO) assured us that scheduling our 3 shipments* under deadline would be no problem.

Naively, I believed them.  [Insert patronizing “oh honey, what were you thinking?” right now.  It’s ok, I deserve it.]

*  3 shipments:

  1. Household Goods – Our stuff, blissfully accumulated during our marriage.
  2. Non-temp storage – More stuff, which we could probably do without but can’t bear to part with just yet. We do know we don’t need or have the space in Hawaii for these things, but presumably we will want to reunite and use these things down the road, whenever that may be.
  3. Unaccompanied Baggage – The essentials to survive while waiting for the blissfully accumulated stuff. Limited to 1,000 lbs.

The disclaimer from TMO, especially when it’s high volume season, is we should be flexible with our dates.   See Operating Procedures #4 above.

Y’all, I was stressing big time, and now I’m here and it doesn’t matter much.  We eventually will get our stuff and our car.  We eventually will move into a home.

Everything is going to be alright.  Life is good!

Aloha!

Valerie

 

p.s.  I will eventually post a few helpful hints & lessons learned, just not today.

No Orders Yet!

ValerieLeave a comment
Bureaucracy
Military Bureaucracy

I have my last few days of freedom before summer break begins and we move.

Perhaps the military will hand us another surprise and change our location…who knows?…what I do know is that we still do not have orders and thus I have no packout date. [Cue the crazy.]

This uncertainty is making me uncomfortable and anxious.

The only thing I know for certain is that the outprocessing/TMO scheduling/packing out/cleaning out the house per the lease agreement is going to be a torrential sh*tstorm when it finally descends upon us.

As I write this, we are suppose to be in Hawaii in 35 days. Clearly to the indifferent military bureaucracy, that is plenty of time to relocate military member, military family and household goods overseas. To the planning milspouse, 35 days without any concrete plans except our lease ending is nothing but severe agitation (read: bitchiness). I know I will be jumping through hoops to get my end of the deal done without penalty and on deadline.  Everything hinges on a packout date!

Meanwhile, I am going through the dwindling pantry coming up with creative menus. I am purging. I am avoiding dealing with the self-perpetuating mounds of papers. (Seriously, where does it all come from?) I’m wondering how we are going to transport our high value items that we usually partial-DITY move with a trailer.

I am manning the homefront and waiting for the hubby to get home from his extended TDY – 2 more weeks to go. I am less than amused when I receive a text that he is enjoying beer & exchanging stories with his classmates after work. Sounds so carefree & relaxing…. I am have become bitter and resentful and not sure how to let go of what I consider a very unbalanced situation. (Sanity check: I decided to dine out for dinner with the kiddos tonight.)

There is always the balancing act of living in the present and preparing for the future when dealing with the military move. Usually, I research online extensively about the next location. But this year, I have little extra brain matter and haven’t prioritized the time to research, so it will be a true adventure upon arrival, which I’m sure will make for some interesting, blissfully ignorant, situations.  We are, after all, “stuck” on an island for 2 years.

Honestly, I am trying to not get ahead of myself. I am trying to keep in together in the here and now – the last 5 weeks have been a whirlwind (Spartan Race, completed the last of the 350 hours for massage license re-certification (and still have 1 more hurdle to go!), dance recital, TKD tournament, birthday celebration, end of school year things, and EFMP/overseas medical clearance shenanigans) – and while I had grandparent reinforcements here for a few of those weeks, I have been doing this solo and my brain capacity has been maxed out. Even though I am excited for the next leg of the journey in Hawaii, we are taking it one day at a time. Just waiting impatiently for orders, so we can get on the housing list (I can’t even begin to think about schools & rentals.) and deal with TMO.  Fun, fun!

How do you handle the uncertainty of a military move?

Valerie
#getamassage

We’re moving to HAWAII!

Valerie1 Comment

Aloha

 

Hubby was notified last week of his next assignment–Hello Hawaii! (Is this for real?! I’m still in disbelief.)

I wish I was more excited about the upcoming move.  We are going to Paradise, after all.

Yes, that’s right—Hawaii!

The military never fails to surprise us – even for this well-seasoned-but-getting-near-the-end military spouse.  The assignment notification came last week–a complete and utterly incomprehensible-for-about-2-days surprise. Not once on our military journey together have the hubby and I dreamed about Hawaii.  Based on his career progression, it never seemed like a realistic possibility. For goodness’ sakes, we were in the heart of Texas for 8 long years and we sure did a lot of dreaming…. about leaving! (Just kidding.  We enjoyed our time there, but it’s not our first choice for our next assignment or our post-military/2nd career relocation when that time comes.)

Anyway, I digress.  Hawaii.  I mean, HAWAII!  Really.

You’d think I’d be ecstatic.  Jumping for joy.  Delighted.  Giggly even.

I will be, once I get there, with my feet in the sand, soaking in Paradise.

I know my lack of enthusiasm won’t elicit much sympathy because “Hello? It’s Hawaii.” Literally every friend I have shared the news has enough enthusiasm for the both of us.  S/he doesn’t have to do the work of moving.  To me, an OCONUS move seems like a complicated mess right now.  I know, I know – I just have to take it one day at a time.

But dang, can’t I vent even a little?

My lack of enthusiasm stems from:

  1. I’m feeling anxious about an OCONUS move and its extra layers of bureaucracy, clearances, planning & organizing.
  2. I can’t do a post-move purge like I usually do as I unpack; and I don’t feel like I have much time to do the pre-move purge with my current commitment load.
  3. I have to give up my dream of DC/Northern Virginia.
  4. I am a planner and have been planning a glorious return to DC/Northern Virginia for months now. Yes, I entirely jumped the gun, but in my defense, all indications pointed to DC, as in this was the only location discussed with the Hubby and the Powers-that-be-aka-Assignment-gods.
  5. I know next to nothing about Hawaii. I have to immerse myself into researching housing and schools.
  6. We are trying to coordinate all of this while Hubby and I are geographically separated.
  7. I am concerned about travel and my aging parents.

    The Downside of Military Life: Dealing with Aging Parents and Travel Limitations for the Holidays

  8. I think I am mad and anxious about truly starting over in a new location. New places & faces.  Friend dating again.    I am a social person and usually enjoy meeting people and exploring, but my energy level doesn’t keep up as much these days.  I really just wanted to return to my comfort zone in Virginia, where I could be myself and be accepted and reunite with old friends.  Let’s face it – moving requires the positive attitude, the smile, and the nice persona for the chance encounter of making fast friendships.  It’s about putting yourself out there, preferably a good version of yourself, to make those little connections that might lead to a friendship.  Now I consider myself a kind, approachable person, and I have made good friends at each duty station (7 states and counting), but I haven’t always been able to be completely myself or to deeply bond either.  Those type of friendships usually take time to develop.  I think what’s wearing on me is the potential for the “lonely feeling” that comes with a move.  Yes, I have the Hubby, but our need for socializing and how we handle moving are completely different.
  9. What are we going to do with our beloved geriatric dog?!

But are you thinking “It’s Hawaii!  People pay good money for a week in Paradise.  You get to live it for 2 whole years!”

Yes, I am so excited! (Once I get there.)  Yes, I can hardly believe it. (I’ll believe it when I get there. Notice a theme?) In the meantime, I’m putting my head down, getting done what needs to get done, and taking it one day at a time.  Breathe.  I do not dare tempt Murphy’s Law (and we’ve already had one stress-maximizing, cash-hemorrhaging fiasco with our car last week just as all of this was going down.)

Here’s to perpetual flip flops, pedicures & casual wear.  Start making your travel plans to mi casa.  Aloha!

Aloha

Valerie

Update: As I looked at photos, I can feel resurfacing some of that boundless enthusiasm I usually have about moving, adventures, letting go and starting anew.  I mean, it IS Hawaii, people!  [Insert giggles of delight.] Having a small vent, acknowledging what’s bugging me and then moving on has been therapeutic.