Following the cookie monster

So I've been getting asked a lot of questions lately, in relation to my marriage (my other half will now be known as "The Cookie Monster") and such. But the one conversation that keeps popping up (and pissing me off) is "Oklahoma? Why would you move there?" "Well, Paul will be there for the last phase of his army schooling, so I'm going out to join him." "But WHY???"

I don't know. Why is the sky blue? Why does my head feel so light, but not float away? What good reasons could I POSSIBLY have for wanting to be with my husband?

I think some people don't realize he is GONE. He is NOT coming back to NJ. After his bit in Kentucky is over (where I'm NOT allowed to follow him), he will go to Oklahoma, and then he will move and live wherever he is assigned to, as his first official duty station. I had originally planned to stay in NJ until after he was done in Oklahoma, but we changed our mind. Why, might you ask?

First of all, he is my HUSBAND. A lot of people (me included) don't realize how different it actually is to go from a girlfriend or fiancee to a full blown wife. Your relationship itself may not change a whole lot, but said former relationship morphs into a much different version of what it used to be. And let's face it; most people get married and (if they haven't already) MOVE IN TOGETHER. Gasp, I know. It's so shocking! I would love to be guzzling cookies ALL THE TIME!

Now, to answer that asininely BURNING question of "why?" By the time The Cookie Monster gets to Oklahoma, we will have been separated for three months, out of three and a half months of marriage. Now, I realize while plenty of other jobs send their workers on business trips, I don't know too many jobs outside the military that send people for multiple months (or even years) at a time. The average business trip for other jobs seems to be 1-2 weeks. But amount of time is not the point- I fully expect any wife who's husband has to go away for a few weeks to miss him JUST as much as I miss my Cookie Monster. I do not hold dibs or the quota on being able to miss anyone, just because I'm a cookie whore.... I mean, an army wife. So WHY said wives who miss their hubbies just as much as I do WOULDN'T understand, I really have no idea.

Ok, imagine. You pledge your undying love and devotion to each other, then say goodbye not long after. Now, YOUR hubby/boyfriend/flying-purple-people-eater (etc.) is on one of his two week business trips. His boss makes him either give him his phone (where he locks it away in a safe that will pelt you with cookie baseballs if you try to break it open), or forces him to place it outside in the pouring rain. Either way, his cell phone is destroyed. He can use a communal company computer for absolute emergencies, but otherwise, he is un-reachable. NO phone calls every night, and no substitute text or email. You get maybe a two-sentence email message twice each week, if you're lucky. Imagine how upset and frustrated you would feel, if starved of cookies from far away for those two whole weeks. Now, imagine if that lasted EIGHT MONTHS instead of two weeks. Would you NOT be ready to commit cookie suicide, after being deprived of your cookies for so long? And then, if you found out you could get your cookies back sooner, and only be apart for THREE months, instead of eight, are you really going to pretend to act like you wouldn't jump at it in half a heartbeat?

So, the answer to this end all be all question is very simple: because I'm a cookie whore. And so are you. So quit acting like you're above it all, and BRING ME THAT DAMN COOKIE JAR!!!