You'd think I'd be used to the leaving by now

The Not Boyfriend left Thursday too soon after the birds started chirping in the trees outside his bedroom window. As soon as he'd jumped out of bed, which he does after decades of being a before-dawn baker, I'd eased over to the center of his bed and pulled out the ear plugs from my ears. I could hear the warbles of the birds clearly as kissed me quickly and I pulled him in close for a longer, tighter hug. A few short steps later, he was out the door. I listened, eyes open, as the deadbolt clicked, then pressed my eyes shut against the sadness.

Two weeks. He will be back from this year's mission in a little more than two weeks. He's in the National Guard, which takes him far past the city once a month and out into the depths of somewhere horrendously humid for two weeks in the summer months. Last year, an additional specialization training landed him in Virginia for four very long months. None of it, thankfully so far, is deployment. None of it war or scary or more than a year of serving in harm's way too many miles and hours and months away from home. That will come. In good time.

But for this June, for this time, I felt the familiar ache of goodbye. I felt my brain wander, even after I woke up alone, still in the center of the bed, even as I pounded it out on the treadmill and then my laptop keyboard and then in rush-hour traffic. I was OK, not sobby or even weepy. But that's not how loss always emerges.

We did the long-distance thing for nearly three years, seeing each other monthly during the best times and six weeks or more during the tougher ones. Just getting to each other was complicated by airline cancellations and delays, fare hikes and spontaneous deadlines at work. There were times that we spent more time in the air then we did in person on our weekends together.

We developed rituals -- sitting at a crowded bar and sharing entrees for dinner, lazing about in bed far past the Not Boyriend's jittery instinct to leap out, long and quiet moments in the car as one of us drove the other to airport, lingering kisses and a quick goodbye, texted Emoji teary faces timed for the traveler to receive while waiting in the security line, a reassuring XO message that we landed safely. 

You'd think that, through all of that back and forth, hello and goodbye, I'd be used to the leaving now. But I'm not. I cry less, yes. I bounce back quicker. I no longer stress about "blackout" Guard periods mandated zero communique. And hours into this departure, I had a sticky-note list of things I'd like to get done while I have more time to myself, a purposeful reframing of my man's absence. 

What always happens is that I have a little bit of wah-wahh and boo-hoo, then I plan, and the next thing I know, he's back. I get on with it, my list never gets completed, and then I start and lose another list for the next time he's away.

How it also works is that the Not Boyfriend, who has often been up too many hours in a row, sweating in his uniform and helmet, carrying a rucksack full of of God-only-knows-what, living with snoring, stinking soldiers in sleeping bags or barracks or on buses, and so he, of course, needs time to decompress, cleanse himself of all that has gone on those days or weeks or months away from the rest of his life.

What I always feel is anxious to see him. Like I want him to show up at my door, weary and still uniformed and overcome with excitement to kiss me/rip my clothes off/catch me up/listen attentively while I catch him up. But somewhere in my zippy brain, I inhale and exhale and remember that what is best for him is a long Epsomy bath, a nap, to pay bills and work out and be still. In that little centered space of brain, there is also the reminder that re-entry is good for me, too. I like, and maybe need, all those things too. 

My friend Lulu asked me why, after all this time and this many trips, why it's tough for me. When I explained, she said, "I hear you saying what you're not saying. It's about what he is going to do." Maybe she hit on something. Maybe it's the mystery and guarded circle of the military, maybe it's the part of his life I don't and can't know too much about, maybe it's my challenge to accept the guns and humvees and possible one-day deployment. I like that he has a life -- lives, really -- outside of ours. I love that we go off to our worlds and then connect and talk about them and support each other get better and bigger and happier. Going away for weeks/months/years to drive convoys through IED-ridden territory and shoot shoulder-aching assault rifles, even if it is on a pretend mission (I can hear him laugh at that, "There is no pretend mission. It is all a mission.") or at a range ("Still a mission.") -- this is the weight in the goodbye. More than sending him off with sad-face texts and long kisses to a pastry kitchen in San Francisco, this is heavy. I don't get it. I don't have to. I may not even be meant to. Just live with it. Just love him. 

He texted me the night after he left, tapping out something about how this time it was easier to leave, that he missed me but he felt more settled. I texted back that maybe all that practice paid off. And maybe it has. There's lots less panic about the silence and distance, or rather, more silence and distance. But just because we are closer and we have done this many times already, it doesn't feel easier. It doesn't feel less of a goodbye. 

Leaving is leaving. Sometimes it serves a purpose, other times it serves people. If you're lucky, those people are you two. Sometimes it is good for a relationship, other times it is just a necessity. If you're centered enough, you make both good for you both.

Maybe what makes all that going and coming back and leaving again work is trusting that the other person will miss you, keep loving you, will come back. And if they don't, you will be OK. For a few days or forever. In a blackout period or long-term silence. You will get up, get moving, get on with things. You will not have to understand why he does all that he does, you will just be there when he returns. And in the meantime, you remind yourself: you will be OK standing alone. At least for today. Probably for two weeks. Maybe next time, more.