Finding the Silver Lining

This is going to be an upsetting weekend for my husband, as his big brother is leaving for Afghanistan tomorrow. We didn't find out all that long ago, and I don't think he's had time to digest the information completely and prepare himself emotionally.

It's also not helping that his going away is leaving us to pick up the pieces. We'll have to babysit his wife (whom no one in the family likes) over the next year to make sure she doesn't blow through all his money or drown the kids in the bathtub or some crap like that.

The silver linings are that when he comes back, he'll have the money to get a divorce, save for the kids' college, etc. He's getting paid pretty well for going, which is good for his family — though personally, my husband and I don't feel it's worth the tremendous risk he is taking by leaving a woman he doesn't trust in charge of raising his kids.

It seems we may benefit from our hard work keeping his wife out of trouble: We may get his second car, which he has been driving for the past year but certainly won't need while he's in Afghanistan. This will really help us since my car hasn't been running lately — I have yet to find a chance to work on it, and we can't afford the Toyota parts it needs, anyway — and therefore my husband and I have been sharing a car for quite some time now. I can't even tell you how nice it will be to have that car for the next year — it might even give us a chance to save up for the Toyota Tacoma parts we need.

All the same, I hope my brother-in-law comes home safe and sound in a year. No amount of money is worth his kids growing up without their father — and my husband living the rest of his life without his brother and his best friend.