Welcome to the Club

My husband’s uniform hangs silent in the closet. It’s something I’m drawn to now and again when a new story breaks his protected surface. I imagine how he must have looked. How he must have felt.

I never had the pleasure of seeing him wearing it except in pictures.  He was already medically red-lighted when we met and not long after that discharged.  He never got to put his uniform back on so his new wife could stand beside him puffed with pride. I have to imagine how it feels to be an Army wife.
Granted, he’s worn the beret for me.  Heck, I’ve worn it, though I only do it to pester him.  I pull it down over my ears and walk into the kitchen like nothing’s different. When I do this I’m instructed to take it off. I usually do not oblige, so he does. Before he removes it from my head however he fixes it into that very specific shape they learned in boot.  He smiles with a hint of sadness and I put it away.
I never got to be part of the club.  I don’t know what military life is like.  I don’t know what it’s like to wait while my husband is far away risking his life.  I don’t know what it’s like to worry while he’s gone. I got him broken and already ravaged by war. I worry about him here.

But I long for the knowledge of those days. I lament never having been there while he stood wearing his career in brightly colored ribbon on his chest. Seeing the man he sacrificed for his country. I missed it.

I feel cheated. Is that childish? So many places and shoulders for military wives. Such a strong and common bond, like an invisible tether between them, unites them in a way I’m not privy to.
I feel like I missed the most important part of his life. Like I may have been able to do something, to help him earlier, to stave off these years of suffering.

And then I remember those military wives in the club that I don’t belong to belong to another club none of us asked to be in. They were there and couldn’t keep it from happening. Their spouses still brought home the monster.

Welcome to the club.