Day 48: Unexpected

Today was a pretty good day. I started the day off with giving my husband a Skype tour of the house. He wanted to see it and see if I have done anything different with it. I tried to tell him that I have literally moved nothing around in the house and it was exactly the same as when he left, but he still wanted to see it. I think he just wanted to see his home. I teased him that he was really just checking up on me to see how well I was keeping the house up. Of course, he said that was not the case. I thought it was funny at least.

At the end of our "tour," a friend of mine came over to drop off her kiddos while she had a doctor's appointment to go to. As they came to the door, Ian asked me to turn the camera around so he could see them. Sam is a new friend that my husband has never met, so I think he just wants to be able to put a face to the name. Sam was a good sport about it and said hi to Ian. After that, the kids played, Ian and I finished up our conversation, and then I dealt with a few phone calls I needed to make today. It wasn't anything super awesome, but still an accomplishment. After lunch my friend came and picked up the kids and then my kids and I relaxed for the afternoon, enjoying the A/C. I then made dinner and got the kids ready to go to VBS again tonight.

As we opened the front door to leave, we saw there was a package there. It was from 1-800-FLOWERS. I was shocked. At first I thought they must have delivered it to the wrong address. Then I looked and saw that it was addressed to me. I wondered who would send me flowers, I knew my husband could be the one that sent them, but he doesn't usually send flowers to me often. So, I opened the box and there were a dozen red roses in there! I was smiling. Then I grabbed the card and read it. It said: "I love you and I miss you, thought I would send some flowers to the woman that I will be spending the rest of my life with." And then, yes you guessed it, I started crying. I couldn't believe he had done this, and above all that, I can't believe that he surprised me! I usually am pretty difficult to take off guard. The last time he sent me flowers, he called me in the late morning and asked if I had received my flowers yet. I hadn't but then I knew I was getting flowers. So, I am so impressed that he refrained from asking me if I had received them when he called to say goodnight at around noon my time.

I have to say, I was crying for a little bit, but they were tears of happiness. I haven't cried about this deployment in a week or two. But tonight, I cried happy tears because my husband thought of me in Afghanistan and had flowers delivered to me for no other reason than to tell me he loves me and misses me. I cried because it was the sweetest thing he could have done. I cried because he used his own spending money to make my day better. I cried because I missed him, but felt close to him at that moment by reading his note. The flowers were nice. They were out in the heat for over an hour (because they didn't knock or ring the doorbell to tell me they were delivering them) so they were a little wilted. That didn't matter to me. The fact that they were sent is what mattered to me. The flowers themselves are not what made me cry, it was the action, the thought, the love in sending them that made me cry. The unexpected gesture of love.......WOW! It just made me feel so special. I walked around the rest of the night, smiling from ear to ear. I carried the note with me the whole night and still have it sitting next to me. Every time I read it, it just reminds me of him and the love that we share. It is enough to get me through this. Having the love of an amazing, heroic man is enough to make the distance mean nothing.

Another day done, one day closer to being in his arms again.

"If you love someone more than anything, then distance only matters to the mind, not to the heart."