290 days.

I read on Tom's blog he has been away from us for 75 days. My ticker says he has 9 months, 2 weeks and 2 days until he comes back to us. I count how long he has left in Korea and he counts how little he has been away from us. Can you tell who the pessimist in this relationship is? It's a bad habit I have, but thank goodness I have him to always see the positive on everything.

In the 75 days he has been gone, I have learned a lot about myself. I learned I became a very dependent person when I married Tom and moved to Germany. He had been living there for a year before we married and he knew the language from years of studying it in school. He knew the culture, the area, how to drive on the autobahn at a ridiculously fast speed and what "Ausfahrt" meant (weird word, right? Yeah it means exit on the autobahn.) He knew how to pay the bills in German, how to get a hold of our German landlord when something was needed in our apartment. He just did it all. I let him do it all. It wasn't until he recently moved to South Korea that I realized just how much I have depended on him for the past 4.5 years. How silly of me right? I wasn't making any effort to be independent and to learn for myself. I liked counting on him. I still do. But now that he is so far away, I am forced to be independent.

In 2.5 months, I have put together shelving units, helped build our patio furniture, killed TWO scorpians, taken Ella to church every Sunday, hung photos straight using a level and toothpaste (thanks Mom for the toothpaste idea..brilliant), fixed a flat tire (well I took it to the shop...but still..), turned our electric on after the many times storms here have shut it off on us, gotten over my fear of walking Riley at night, learned to change the propane on the grill, fixed our vacuum not once, but twice (turns out sucking up ballpoint pens probably isn't the smartest thing), fixed our wireless router, and I've even taken Ella out to dinner by myself. Hell, I mowed AND edged the lawn this week (first time in my whole life). To some these may seem like such trivial things, but I used to depend on Tom for all of that. I'm really proud of myself. I'm most proud because I have kept Ella safe and happy this whole time. I CAN do this. I can and will be ok for the next 290 days. That's all I have left...290 days. I only have 3/4 of the year left before my handsome man is back and in my arms again. How's that for optimism?

And I will be the happiest girl in the world to have him back. After all, who can resist that face?