I lie beside him tonight lost in my own worries, fear, love, and sadness. We are facing yet another deployment and it's one neither of us were expecting due to the nature of the assignment and its duration. I find myself already slipping into that pre-deployment anticipation mode. I am emotional and clingy, trying to hold back tears while wanting to savor every little thing. I alternate between denial and that sickeningly familiar weight on my chest that I know as deployment.

I remember so clearly how difficult nights are without him, how empty and tortuously long. I snuggle close and wrap my arms around him, not worrying about waking him; he sleeps so deeply it would take a force of nature to wake him. He's warm against me and I revel in that a moment. I breathe in his natural scent - a little sweet, a little soapy, but decidedly male - and it washes over me as a fondly familiar scent from childhood would. It conjures short scenes from our life together thus far and is at once comforting and saddening, because I am also reminded of how much we miss when he's gone.

Seven months seemed maddeningly long during his last deployment, especially considering it occurred at the beginning of our marriage. He's been home nearly a year thanks to the school in Army land; we should be counting our blessings for that one. And yet, all I can think of is how difficult, how empty my day to day life is without my husband, my other half.

The praying for a phone call, never straying far from an internet connection, daily worry and sleepless nights ... for a year plus? I know others have done far longer deployments but tonight, at 0342, I am having trouble fathoming going back to that state of existence for so very long. I think I like my denial better.