Making Sense of the Happily Ever After

                                                                                                                                                                           As a little girl I thought I had my life figured out. I would marry a handsome prince just like in my entire favorite princess Disney films and I would live happily ever after. That was the dream I desperately hoped to have but deep down I knew it would not be that easy.

 I grew up in El Salvador in 1983, ten months after my birth, my father had to leave the country. You see in 1979 leftist guerrilla warfare had broken out in the cities and the countryside launching what became a 12-year civil war. My father worked in the Salvadorian military at that time, and he had no choice but to flee El Salvador if he wanted to survive and protect his family. The United states was granting Amnesty during this time therefore, not only did he leave but requested for my mother to do the same two years later.
    
 My sisters and I grew up with our grandparents. My grandparent’s relationship was not the greatest. They would constantly fight and my grandfather was always drunk. Several times he abused my grandmother both physically and emotionally. To me this became normal; the yelling the beatings and the constant fighting. It was no Disney film but I still kept my hopes high and I knew that this would never happen to me because my prince charming would never do that.
  
  When I finally turned 10 my parents arrived to El Salvador and that was the first time I had seen my father. I remember coming home from school and seeing a tall, dark haired, light skinned man walk out of my grandmother’s room. My sister ran immediately to him and gave him a hug. I just stood there trying to figure out what was going on. I stared at that man and he looked familiar. I knew I had seen him before somewhere. He called me to go to him and then that’s when I realized that he was my dad. I had never seen him in person before but I remembered his pictures. I had spoken with him on the phone for 10 years but I had never seen him physically.

      That same year my sister and I moved to the United States. It was my sisters and I first time in a plane. We landed in Maryland and everything seemed so different. No mountains, no fresh air, no hollering bus drivers, no markets on the street, it was very different. I looked around and even the people were different. I was never exposed to different nationalities and backgrounds, and worst of all I didn’t understand what they were saying.

      Elementary was not my best experience. I hated school. Kids would make fun of me and I was constantly being picked on. I used to come home and cry I had no motivation to ever go back to school. My sister felt the same way but we had each other to comfort our bad times. Middle school was the same; I was picked on because I was the shy quiet girl who barely spoke English. I felt discriminated against by my peers.
  
   High School was different. I opened up more and made unforgettable friends. But it is in high school when I started to realize how unhappy my mother was. My father had put her through very rough times and I had seen her cry tons of times even though she did not want to admit it. My father constantly would cheat on her and she was very discrete about it. I remember asking her why didn’t she just file for divorce. At that time I had no clue how divorce can affect people it just seem easy to do. She responded to my question by saying that she could not afford to raise my sister and I by herself. She had no money, she had no education and she didn’t speak English well enough. I didn’t know what to say to that. I didn’t want her to sacrifice her happiness for my sister and I. But she did.

      My sister joined the Navy right after high school and I went off to college. The thought of my mother kept me trying throughout school to succeed. I said to myself I would never become dependant of a man. I will work hard for my own things and I will never have a child without knowing that I can independently take care of him/her. That fairy tale dream I had growing up of prince charming suddenly became obstruct.

      It was not until my last year in college when I finally found my prince charming. I married him, of course divorced him and later went back to him. It was not until him and I was completely over without the fairy tale ending, it is then when I realized why did I grow up believing on the perfect ending? Life is not a fairy tale and it’s not that perfect movie you see on the screen now and days. You have to work hard in your relationship and it takes two people to be able to do that. My mother did not stay with my father because she feared that she could not raise us the same without him, she stayed with my father because she loved him and deep down she wanted him to change so she could have her happily ever after. My grandmother did not stay with my grandfather until he died because she could not get out of the relationship; she stayed because she loved him.

      A good friend of mine once said, “I wish I could be more like my love songs. I am a hopeless romantic though, never certain of love when I have it and never have it when that is what I want most.” We as human beings are always chasing for love, even subconsciously and yet when it is in front of us we are not certain of it. We are perfectionist and we want our relationships to be absolutely perfect, and when it does not turn that way, we are quick to walk away from it. After we walk away it is then when we miss the love we had and wonder why we were uncertain and judgmental in the first place. Every relationship is different and every person is different and sometimes it is best to walk away.

      What I did learn from all this is that life is hard, is no Disney film and there is not always a happy ending but there is an ending. It may not always be the one that we want but the choices we make will determine how our ending will be. It is up to us to make the film of our lives the best we can regardless of the obstacles that life throws our way. And even though I know now there is no such a thing as a prince charming that just only means that I will not be that perfectionist when it comes to relationships ☺. Relationships are already difficult as it is.

Princess Pictures by sandersartstudio.com

Chapter Closed

As my usual ritual of coming home from work, sitting in my couch after dinner and checking my facebook account I came across an ad for freelance writing jobs. It caught my eye right away. The last time I wrote an article was in college and even though I am an English Media major, that skill was lost when I decided to join the Army.

What to do? I clicked on the link and my heart rose. Is this a sign? Should I continue to follow what once was my passion? Would I have the time? Do I have the dedication? Millions of questions were intriguing my mind and yet the more I thought about it the more I wanted to give it a try. Would anyone read my articles? Would my application even be accepted?

As I was searching through my documents I came across an essay I had wrote in college about myself. As I read the essay I realized through the years that have passed I lost the confidence that I had in myself, and in my writing. What happened? What went wrong? How did I loose control of my life?

I joined the Army four months after graduating from college. I always wanted to travel and ever since I could remember I wanted to join the Army. I came into the service as an Enlisted Soldier. Two months after my enlistment I married my boyfriend whom I dated eight months. He had also joined the Army with me. I worked as a Human Resources Specialist and my first duty assignment was Hawaii. The desire to form a family with my spouse was soon shattered when the Army decided to station him at Fort Bragg, North Carolina. I thought to myself how is this possible? What happened to all that paperwork we filled out to join the Army Couples Program, how can they separate us? Come to find out that program states that your first assignment as a married couple is never guaranteed. I felt my heart break into little pieces. Thousands of miles away from each other how could we make this work?

Five months after arriving to Hawaii my unit left to Iraq. Not only was I separated from my newly husband but now I was in a completely different continent. I tried everything I could to submit paperwork to leave Hawaii and go to Fort Bragg but all my paperwork was denied. The 15 months spent in Iraq were the longest. I was blessed to have a great job, traveled around the country and kept myself occupied, but every night I would stare at the moon and think of my husband and wonder if he thought about me as much as I thought about him. When my Iraqi tour was close to be over I was excited to be able to come home and spend thirty well deserved days with my husband. To my surprise the thirty days did not happen. Instead, on the last month I had left in Iraq my husband was put on deployment orders. This could not be happening, I though to myself.

I was able to see my husband for four days that whole year. As I was leaving Iraq he was coming in. Another year went by without spending time with each other. He came home on Rest and Recuperation for 18 days. Those were the best 18 days of my life. I remember that last night before he left he held me close and I could hear him cry. I cried myself and I knew that I did not want the next day to come. I wanted to freeze time and just stay there with him by my side forever. Reality checked in and the next day came. His parents drove us to the airport. We had lunch and we pretended everything was fine. We would be strong and make it through. As we finished our lunch you could hear the boarding call. My heart started beating fast, my hands were sweaty, and I just wanted to run away with him. I knew I had to be strong for him so I told myself do not cry. The moment came he hugged me, I did not want to let go, but I did, I told him to be safe and I would see him in six months. He then walked away and looked back at me until I could no longer see his face. As soon as that happened I could not stop my tears. The love of my life was once again leaving me and I could do nothing to stop it. I could not imagine how military wives went through this every deployment. I had been married for two years and had only seen my husband less than 50 days within the two years. I had become that military wife without even knowing it.

A month and a half later, after seeing my husband from rest and recuperation him and I had an argument and he asked me for a divorce. I was shocked. After all we had been through he no longer wanted to be with me. I cried and tried to work things but he no longer wanted to continue our relationship. I then submitted the paperwork. I sent it to him in Iraq and we were divorced a month later.

I had my dreams and goals based around him. What to do now I said to myself? I focused on working out, and allowing myself to get ready to go into Officer Candidate School. I went through school and more school and four months after our divorce my ex-husband contacted me. He said he made a mistake, and he wanted a second chance. Why would he do that to me? I was moving on with my life and there he was again. What to do? My heart without question knew the answer yet my mind thought otherwise.

I followed my heart. I gave my ex husband a second chance. I was very hesitant and was really not sure if it was the right choice. I had this trust issue with him and I had my barriers up. Divorce was very tough on me and I did not want to risk my heart again but yet I did. Six month after getting back with each other it was over. Him and I were no longer the same two people that once were crazy about each other. He was not the 23 year old man I met he was now 28 and I was no longer that 21 year old, I am now 26. We grew apart, we had different beliefs and goals now and we gave up. Where did it all go wrong? What happened to the happy ending?

The confident college student who is now a second lieutenant in the United States Army, has the house, has the dog, has the motorcycles, yet she is missing the husband. Where did I loose control of my life? Amazing how a simple Ad on freelance writing can make you think. Amazing how a simple Ad on freelance writing can make you write. Amazing how writing about anything can make you feel better.

Maybe I will never get over my ex-husband, maybe I will never get back the confidence or writing skills I once had in college, maybe nobody would really read my writing, but expressing how I feel on paper, and just writing about anything that comes to mind that is starting over, starting fresh, starting the new chapter in my life and closing the old one.