Will post more on Monday but here's a little something that I'm thankful for. My military friends and family will REALLY understand this. Thanks to all the troops past, present and future for all that they do. 

I cannot promise you every night of my life. 

I cannot promise to be beside you for every difficult moment, every trial, and every hardship. 

In truth, I can promise you that I will not be with you for most. 

I will leave you at inconvenient times. 

Any special date to us may be tainted with the anniversary of the death of one of my friends. 

I will ask you to take over whatever... life we have built together for months and years at a time. 

And will then crash back into that life that you have used your sweat, your tears and your heartache to keep together, and try to take it back as I knew it before. 

I will shut you out at times because it will be the best way for me to hold it together at that moment. 

I will lie to you. I will tell you I don't know things when I do. 

I will not always tell you where I am going, when I will be back, or who I am with. 

I may not call you for weeks and months and you will not be able to call me.

You will ask questions that I won't answer. 

You will know answers to questions that you will hope you never need. 

I will share things with my brothers and sisters that you will never understand. 

They will know things about me that you never will. 

They will be a support to me in some things that you cannot be.

I will miss birthdays. 

I will miss anniversaries. 

I may need time to process things that seem natural to everyone else. 

It will seem that someone - or something - will always take precedence over you.

 I will uproot you and ask you to re-establish our family anywhere in the world, in any season, at any time - over and over again. 

Sand and mud will be tracked through your halls from the boots I am too tired to take off.

I will leave you when you beg me not to. 

I will stand at attention while you cry beside me. 

I will not turn my head and I will walk away. 

I will knowingly break your heart. And I will do it again - and again. 

I cannot promise you all of me. 

I cannot promise you much of anything. 

But if you will have me, I can promise that as I march away from you, it is not without sharing your heartache. 

I promise you that every time I break your heart I will be breaking mine. 

Every time that I cannot answer you I will be protecting you. 

Whenever you want to call and you have no number to dial, I will be wanting to do the same. 

I will protect everything that we have created together with every fiber of my being while you do the same back at home. 

I will honor you in everything - every moment that we are apart and every moment that I am with you. 

I will fight harder and push further knowing that I do so for you. 

And I will carry you with me in everything, until my boots once again sit just inside our door.