Today is the day! Master Corporal Joshua Stauffer has officially been released from the military and is now working full time as an installer with Shaw. This was a decision that was long time coming and I think we're both in a bit of shock that it's finally here and happening. It was just under a year ago that I called Josh was he was on a training exercise in Wainwright and told him that I feel done with the military life. I was definitely in a bit of a rough place and having him gone was tough but, for the first time in our relationship, I felt truly done with the military. When I told him that Josh responded with, "Okay. I'll look into the release process as soon as I get back to Edmonton". He knew that this was a very serious claim on my part but also that his time in the military was going to come to an end at some point in the near future as we looked forward to further growing in our marriage and starting a family. Both of which as fairly difficult endeavors while remaining in the military life.
In January we worked hard on his resume and all those hours of editing sure did pay off because he got a call right away from Shaw asking him to come for an interview! Kudos to my mom for her help in this awesome resume-writing process! The day of the interview was far from idyllic in terms of what was going on in our personal lives but Josh must have nailed it despite all this because he got offered a job soon after. The amazing thing is that, from what we knew, it is not common to get an offer after only one interview. I must say I was (and am!) quite the proud wife for having such an awesome husband :)
Initially Josh had planned on giving the military 3 months notice for his last day since the technical requirements is that he only needed to give them 1 month once he had another job lined up. As usual, things on the military end didn't work out as anticipated and they required him to stay in for another 6 months. There is no real reason for this decision or appeal process so we just went with it, trusting that there would be value in Josh spending a few extra months in the military. Yet another huge blessing at this time was the fact that Shaw was incredibly willing to hold Josh's job for the 6 months as he released. We didn't expect them to since that is asking a lot from a future employer but we were so grateful it was offered! During the first bit of his last months in the military Josh was extremely close to being sent to Poland for a mission, which would have drastically changed the course of his release process. Obviously in the end he didn't go but in some ways it was fun to have that last minute, critical change of plans looming over us, as is the military's MO, almost as a last little ho-rah to military life. "Fun" might not be the best descriptor...
And now the day has come that we have been hoping for and anticipating for almost a year. He is officially DONE with the military (*technically they can still call on him for a few more years if there is a national or global crisis but we're thinking the chances of that are fairly slim). Here are some of the key changes we're looking forward to for the first time in our relationship:
- knowing that Josh will be home every night unless we decide to make plans otherwise
- not having to go long stretches of tediously coordinating phone calls that usually have mediocre to poor reception anyways so we spend most of the time saying, "What did you say? Pardon?"
- not having a work number come up on his phone and wondering if he has to suddenly go in to work, or to some forsaken corner of the world, at any hour of the day or night
- not having military kit ALL OVER THE HOUSE (ok, he's gotten a lot better about thing since I've had a few mental breakdowns following too much visual exposure to green cadpat. However, we will still have an interesting collection of military issued items that will be kicking around our place for quite a while yet.)
- not getting into fights the night before a long stretch because we have different ideas about how to spend our time together before he leaves (Josh would spend it packing because he procrastinated earlier in the week and I would be annoyed because I wanted to spend quality time with him while I could!)
- Josh not having to work 24hr shifts at the duty desk, which always seemed to get scheduled on the most inconvenient days
- no more enforced haircut specifications! Just to spite the military a little bit I think his first cut will be a square cut at the back. Ha!
- no more extras! Josh hasn't been given extras in quite some time now but it's nice to know that he will never have to stay late after work to sweep a parking lot because he made a joke about poop to the wrong crowd...
Yes, there will always be things we miss about the military life; one of my top ones being those military issued wool socks! I will still occassionally make Josh call me ma'am, he will still salute me when I bark orders at him and I will certainly require him to show me his special march skills at the most random times and places so as to keep at least a little bit of the military legacy alive and present ;) We are confident this change is what's best for our lives and we look forward to this new career adventure. Welcome to civilian life, Stauffer!
-S
