found this touching story in my email's inbox ...


A Soldier’s Wife

Leah Lyn Sarmiento Locsin
Cavaliers Wife


For all of 21 years, I never imagined myself marrying a soldier – until I met my Husband. I just could not think of having a husband who would spend most of his time away from me, fighting for causes far removed from the life.

But after two years we introduced, I was the bride in a very solemn and beautiful “white duck” wedding at sunrise the day after the love of my life graduated from Philippine Military Academy. Throngs of family and friends gathered in the early morning fog at Loakan to witness me march down the PMA amphitheater on the arms of my parent and squired by gala-uniformed mistahs (classmates), while my Husband, the groom, serenaded me at the bottom of long flight of stairs.

The day I walked into marriage my husband, and the Army. Such a sweet initiation for the plebe wife that I was!

The honeymoon lasted only a month we used it to enjoy each other and put our new life together. All too soon, we had to go back to the daily grind: me to my job and in graduate school; and he to officer’s school six to seven hours away from were we lived. For five months thereafter, he arrived homes in the wee hours of Saturday morning and always on a tight schedule. They were in the shortest weekends in my life.

I didn’t realized then what bliss those crammed weekends until my Husband was ordered to report in Mindanao. I wept and panicked as fear full thoughts flashed through my mind. Mindanao, during the first year of our marriage? That meant it would be fortunate to see my Husband twice a year if at all. How many little room the Army has for family life. Perhaps the adage is true: If the Army wanted a soldier to have a wife, it would have issued him one.

Still folded in my Husband’s embrace and sobbing, I barely heard the better part of the news: He was not going to assigned Basilan or Maguindanao, both notorious conflicts down in south. I managed a brave smile for him.

I was appalled that my Husband and his mistahs wanted to take the post in far-flung corners of the country. Was I relieved the tragedy that struck the changed; their mind before they sail! I saw him off at the pier, feeling like one of the women saying goodbye at wharves or tarmacs in faded World War II movies.

When I promised to love my Husband for as long as I lived, I knew I was choosing a difficult life. I braced myself for a staggered married life, long separations, the drudgery of Army living in remote areas, bringing up children virtually alone and anxieties without end. I had also carefully considered the visions and values that we shared, especially in an era when the line separating the right and wrong blurred. Love, we believed is not just gazing into each other’s eyes, it is looking together in the same direction.

Having been brought up to think critically, I was not a great admirer of military institution. But my Husband opened my mind to the many realities that still make the soldier one of the noblest profession. And soon I realized that it is impossible to separate the Husband who loves me from the soldier he is: he is one and the same man. When I married him, I resolved to share his perspective of the Army with a loyalty that had no qualifications. After all, he had pledged his life to the Army and his country as he did to me in marriage-“till death do as part”.

Thus, I have settled into proverbial military marriage, wich thought me how to give that curios gift of waiting without making demands or asking for rewards. I am in the same shoes as every other devoted young Army wife; the difference is only in the details.

As it was the day during our courtship, our letters allows us to grow together despite the distance between us and the vast difference in our day to-day realities. How ever, mails travels at snail’s pace, so we keep in touch daily with calls, except when my Husband is out and stalking the enemy. Thank God for cellular phones! My elder sisters in the Army did not this luxury and I can only marvel at how they manage to endure the anxiety. Our phone bills are monstrous, but it is small price we have to pay for our peace of mind.

Then there is a matter of reunions. Being the most junior officer in the battalion with a dearth of officers, my Husband has the fewest chances of going home. He has come home three times in eight months-once for two days, twice for little more than a week. Thus, we placed great value on every opportunity we can be together-at home or where he is posted-no matter how brief. When he is home I practically put my “normal” life on hold. (Normal, of course, is what I do when he is not around.)

During the Christmas holidays last year in the hinterlands of Lanao del Norte, I got a glimpse of what my Husband’s work is like. While I was there, he continued his job 24 hours a day. It’s never easy for him but he likes it and believes in it, and that makes all our sacrifices worth it. I wonder thought if civilians realize how much military families sacrifice so that the nation can feel safe enough to sleep soundly each night.

After being married for over a year, I thought I had adjusted well to the lifestyle that largely dictated by my Husband’s profession. But a tragic incident last April sent me a reeling back to reality. My Husband’s class had its first casualty, and struck very close to home. The fallen mistah was a very good friend of my Husband, and he stood as a sword sponsor at our wedding. He was killed in an encounter with the New People’s Army in Kalinga. And He was not even 23 years old.

His death made me realize that life is merely privileged, especially for the men and women in arms. No matter how good they are or how hard they work, they’ll never know if they will live long enough for their sacrifices to bear fruit. Whenever my Husband walks out the door to heed the call of duty, I am never sure if he will return to me alive. And I have to live with that. Such is the fate of the one who enters into an Army marriage.

Yet I forget on, without regret and always striving to match my Husband’s courage. We live by words of the poet Kahlil Gibran that I asked to be inscribed on our wedding invitation: “When love beckon to you, follow it, though its ways are hard and steep. “




“ Dedicated to all soldiers who waste their lives in battle for God, for Country, and for Family “

God bless our people in uniform this Christmas.

:salute:

To all brave soldiers sacrificing for this republic to have peace...

my heartfelt thanks to all soldiers in uniform...

Merry christmas and a happy new year.. :armycheers:

God bless our men and women in uniform. :ssalute:

Merry Christmas and a Happy New Year!

And to think many of them will not be enjoying Christmas with their families.

Merry Christmas and God Bless

:thumb: