Day 273: Trapped

03/22/2012

Today was a rough day at work, the only bright spot in my day being a phone call from a camp director telling me that my girls can be dropped off early so I can make the reintegration training that is supposed to start at the same time. It was awesome because if I couldn't drop them off an hour early, they would not have been able to go. So, that was about it for the good portions of my day.

My day at work was hard and was overall a difficult day. When I came home, my day got a lot worse. I came home to find a warning on my door telling me that I needed to have my lawn mowed and weeded by 3pm tomorrow. If I did not have my lawn mowed by 3pm, I was going to get a citation AND a $45 force cut fine. So, I called the number on it to talk to the person who issued the citation. I told her that my husband was deployed, I don't own a lawn mower, and I work full-time as a teacher on post. I told her that I don't have enough time to get to the self-help store to borrow a lawn mower and asked her nicely if I could have a 1 day extension. She told me no, but said she had a soldier right there that could do it for me for $20 to avoid a citation, and handed him the phone. I felt so trapped! I had no choice but to say yes and pay him. I was so upset that they wouldn't even give me a day to get to the weekend so I could actually do it. Then saw he was a Sergeant and brought our 2 lower ranking soldiers to help him. It all just sat wrong with me. Then, before he left, he asked me not to say anything about this to the Sergeant First Class that was over him. Which told me that what he was doing was shady. So, yeah, I was so mad and upset that I had been treated like this and had not been given a chance, especially given the fact that my husband is deployed. I don't expect special treatment in the way that I feel like I should be above the rules, but it would be nice to have some leeway in the area of extra time to get me to a weekend.

So, yeah, it was just a bad ending to a bad day. I can't wait until they start back up the mowing program for deployed spouses. It helps a lot. Luckily it starts next week! Yay!