What Showing Up Really Means
When I did the series on supporting military families through a PCS, one of the points I made was to show up. This post may get a little more ranty than I usually do, but one of the biggest things we can do to support our military families is to show up for them. I am fresh off of a weekend of showing up for and being shown up for in military life. I don't know how many years officially make a tradition, but we are coming off of our third year of meeting my oldest friend and her husband somewhere roughly halfway between our two cities for President's Day weekend.
Some things are more often than not givens in military life. Service members will be gone. Money will be tight. We will be stationed far away from everything we know and love. There's never enough leave in the tank. Of course, there are exceptions and variations to these rules, but most military families face a combination of these issues, which affects their ability to show up for their loved ones.
I have been very fortunate that our four years in Oklahoma did not affect my ability to see family. My parents have very flexible work schedules so that they could visit often, and anytime they were working within a few (five or so) hours of me, I would drive up to see them. We were financially able to afford flights home whenever I needed them, but we never had enough leave, so my husband had to skip out on most of those trips. Living in Oklahoma meant that we used our leave almost exclusively to visit family rather than take vacations as a couple (going home rarely feels like a vacation, no matter how much we love seeing our family).
I understand that civilian families face these same constraints. They may not be bound to a tight local radius, but they are hindered by finances and the ability to take time off work. I know plenty of people whose "off" days never end up next to one another. And I know how hard it is to stay afloat in the world, no matter how great a job pays. But this dynamic often puts the responsibility on the military family to show up back home.
This dynamic may be great for your family, and I know I am entirely biased based on my upbringing. Anything less than 7 hours round trip is a day trip, making it easier to show up for people. That is not how everyone feels about driving, which is completely ok. I just want to be clear that if we ask our military families to overcome x,y, and z to visit, we have to be willing to do the same.
Military families are often stationed multiple states away from their families. They load up the car once a year to be home for Thanksgiving, Christmas, or spring break and drive them and their kids 10, 15, 20 plus hours to see family. Buying four or five plane tickets isn't an option, so they must drive. And they do because it's worth it to see family. Often, they find two frustrating things when they put in this effort, though.
First, people don't return the favor. Sure, some people do, and there are certainly some people who can't, but more often than not, many people won't. Living in Oklahoma, we had parents, siblings, and grandparents visit, but there were also a lot of people who said they would visit but never got around to doing it. And so because of that, we often ran into problem number two, especially when visiting my husband's family.
Coming home for my husband meant that we were on a tight schedule. We split time between his family and mine since they only live 3 hours apart. While visiting his family, we rushed between his parents, siblings, grandparents, and friends. These are all important people who mean a lot to him, and we want to make the effort to see them. But it's also almost always us putting in the effort to see people, especially with friends. We don't have this same issue when visiting my family purely because 90% of my friends moved away after graduation, so there isn't anyone besides family in my hometown.
I know military families often run into this, especially when their parents still live in the town they grew up in. We arrive in a city for a few days with a list of people we want to see, places to eat, and things we want to do. And it falls on us to coordinate running from place to place to make sure that we see everyone, all while knowing that half the people on that list would never try to come see us.
Three years ago, for Christmas, I surprised my husband by buying his best friend a plane ticket to visit. The flight was paid for and scheduled for a time when my husband was guaranteed to be home. That friend had some medical complications for that trip, so he had to cancel with the intention of rescheduling once it cleared up. But that never happened. This person had a free flight to visit my husband and never used it. American Airlines made $300 from the expired credit, which was not my intention when buying the gift. I understand things come up, and stuff happens, but I do not excuse three years of never using a free opportunity to visit, all while saying, I'm going to visit soon.
On the flip side, I have a friend (same friend I just saw this weekend) who lives in Indianapolis which was 11 hours away from us in Oklahoma. She and her husband drove 11 hours out to see us. They spent one night and then drove the 11 hours back. When her husband's mom died, I immediately booked a flight out there despite the fact that it was a last-minute plane ticket, and I was literally days away from being too pregnant to fly. I went straight from a conference in NC to see them for two days before flying home.
I hope that people can see the difference between those two stories. I don't have an answer because everyone should handle this differently, and I know we all face circumstances that dictate why we do things the way we do. But when military families put in the time, effort, and energy to visit, please don't make it the most exhausting thing. We shouldn't need a vacation from our vacation, and that's often how people feel after visiting home.
I know I have a different relationship with my family than a lot of people do. I wanted my mom and sister in the delivery room with me. I wanted my mom and brother to be there when the movers arrived at our new house. Having your mom out in those scenarios may be a recipe to grate your nerves to no end. But I bet there is someone you want. I hope that person is showing up for you. I hope that we have relationships in our lives where we can call up, say I need you, and know that the person on the other end will do everything they can to get to us, whether that involves walking next door, hopping in the car, or booking a flight.
If we really want to support our military families, it starts by showing up in their lives. It starts by showing that the distance doesn't mean anything, which doesn't necessarily mean physically showing up, but it does mean phone calls, FaceTime, and texts. It starts with figuring out a way to make things work when they are hard.
This friend and I have been friends for 13 years. That's an incredibly long time, and we've both experienced a lot of life and a lot of different experiences in that time. We've worked to stay connected. We show up for each other whether that looks easy or not. Meeting halfway between us for our annual gathering isn't easy because it always involves costs of food and lodging, not to mention the fact that "halfway" is usually a 5-7 hour drive one way for each of us.
I know that time zones can be the biggest pain, flights have become more expensive, and time off is often fleeting for everyone. Still, if military members figure out how to make all those things work, we should be able to do the same for them. If we really want to thank somebody for their service, we should show up for them in whatever way they need because loving someone isn't just about being there for the holidays; it's about being for them in every way we can.