Take Me Home… Country Road

If you haven’t followed Our Story, you might want to start at the beginning.

In April of 1995 Sailor left Panama and moved to West Virginia. I knew nothing about West Virginia other than it was country… and I wasn’t.

I wanted to give our marriage one last try (I hate failing) so I agreed to move to WV with Sailor.

Once Sailor got to West Virginia he learned that there was no base housing available on the little military base. Not only was there no base housing there were no rentals available within an hour’s drive. The closest town was Harrisonburg, VA, an hour away and over a large and looming mountain.

Sailor had no choice but to find an apartment for our family in Harrisonburg, VA. I was actually quite relieved to NOT live in West Virginia. After Sailor found a two bedroom apartment and my college semester ended my dad loaded up a moving van and drove me and baby girl to the mountains of Virginia.

I remember being in awe of Virginia’s beautiful mountains and cooler weather. We left Florida wearing t-shirts and shorts and I actually had to hunt around in my suitcase for a sweater once we arrived at our new house.

When we pulled up in the moving van a bunny was nibbling on a plant in the front yard, this place was like nothing I’d ever seen. We had views of the sun setting over the mountains in our front yard and I could hear cows mooing in the distance.

I was excited about our fresh start.

My dad stayed for a few days and helped baby proof our apartment and then headed south again.

It was just us. Sailor, baby girl, and myself… could we make this work? Sailor claimed to be a changed man, but I hadn’t actually spent any time with him to know if this was true.

Shortly after settling in we quickly realized Sailor’s paycheck wasn’t going to cover our expenses and debt. Apparently while we were living apart Sailor managed to rack up quite a debt on his Star card. We were already living at the bare minimum with only one car, no cable, and no extras. We were broke and I didn’t know how we were going to make it work.

Sailor found a job at the grocery store down the road and so began our new routine.

He would wake up and leave the house before I was awake and head to work. He would arrive home around 5:45pm, eat a quick dinner and head to the grocery store to work the evening shift in the produce department.

He was tired all the time and I was lonely. I can’t quite remember why he got the second job instead of me… but that’s just how it happened.

I wanted friends, every day I walked our neighborhood pushing the stroller hoping to meet someone. I got smiles and waves… but no friends. Apparently most of the people in our neighborhood were either college students or retirees and none of them pushed a stroller up and down the street every day of the week.

I spent my days walking the neighborhood, entertaining baby girl, killing flies, watching Barney every day at 3pm, waiting for the rabbit to appear, rearranging furniture, clipping coupons, and learning how to sew and cook. Unfortunately cleaning the house was not on my list.

Even with Sailor’s extra job we were barely getting by. Things were so bad that on the way down the mountain he would often shut off the car and coast, to save on gas.

Sailor felt like we needed more help so he decided that we should apply for WIC. I didn’t want to do it. I didn’t want any help, I wanted to do it all myself. Finally after much persuading I agreed, but only for a few months, until we paid off the debts. Then we would remove ourselves from the program.

While working nights in the produce department one of Sailor’s jobs was to throw away the expired produce. Things were marked for the garbage and it was Sailor’s job to take them out to the dumpster every evening at the end of his shift.

Many times these vegetables were still edible, but because they were expired they had to be thrown out. Sailor would stack the expired produce in boxes outside the dumpster. Instead of throwing them away he would bring them home.

I felt like my life was crumbling… we were receiving free milk and more cheese than anyone could possibly eat through WIC, we were eating food destined for the dumpster, I had no car, no job, no friends, and things with Sailor weren’t getting much better.

The day before Thanksgiving I received a call from my husband’s work. There had been an accident on the mountain. Sailor hit a patch of black ice and wrecked our car, our only car!

At least I had one thing to be thankful for that Thanksgiving. Sailor walked away from the accident without even a scratch. We made pizza for Thanksgiving and received a basket of free food from the Navy base.

I hated being poor.

After Thanksgiving we found out that because we drove a certain type of car repairs and parts would take five weeks! We would be without a car for Christmas! We wouldn’t even be able to get lights for our Christmas tree.

My husband had a friend who graciously offered to take him to work every day. He walked to his second job at the grocery store. The same friend also took us Christmas shopping and did what he could to help us.

Christmas was sparse but it was happy. We spent it with Sailor’s sister and then my family came to visit. I stopped feeling sorry for myself because I was so excited to have people in our little apartment.

Christmas ended and I was prepared for a winter funk when I awoke one morning to a surprise. Snow! And not just any snow, a blizzard. As Sailor and I excitedly shoveled our sidewalk, as only dummies from Florida would do in a blizzard, the snow was pouring down. It took us about three hours to realize that shoveling snow during a blizzard was pointless.

Once it stopped snowing we were left with almost six feet of snow. Our car was buried and our street was not plowed so we were stuck, just the three of us.

We wanted baby girl to experience snow so we wrapped her tennis shoes in Ziploc bags and put on four pairs of pants. We couldn’t afford snow pants or boots so we made do. She wasn’t thrilled with the snow, but I wouldn’t have been either if my feet were wrapped in plastic bags.

After our street was plowed and life got back to normal I resumed my daily walks. I was determined to meet someone! One day I came home from our walk and realized that baby girl had snot frozen to her face! What kind of mother was I?

I gave up on walking until the spring.

Good things happened that year.

I learned to cook. No more hot dogs and fettucini alfredo! We had moved up to sausage (purchased with a double coupon) and yellow rice, quiche (free with all our WIC food), and cream based stews.

I found the green cabinet.

Sailor was certified as an EMT.

Sailor received his AA degree from a community college.

I learned how to make the perfect pie crust.

We had an ice storm and Sailor and I slid down our steep driveway on raincoats.

I threw my first Cinco de’ Mayo party.

Sailor was promoted, got a raise, and was able to quit the grocery store job.

We paid off the last of our debt (except the car).

We got internet.

Unfortunately I was consumed with all the bad things that were happening. We were still fighting, we had problems with our landlord, our storage area flooded, we still didn’t have many friends, Sailor was still tired and I was still lonely.

In May we celebrated our third anniversary and our first anniversary together. The same friend who took Sailor to work every day offered to babysit so we could go out on a date for our anniversary. Even though this guy had never held a baby or changed a diaper in his life we jumped at the chance for our first date night in several months.

Later that month Sailor drove baby girl and I to Dulles to catch a flight to Florida. After a year of living in Virginia I was going back home to see my sister graduate from high school. I was excited to have a break from my life.

Little did I know it would be nine years until I saw Harrisonburg, Virginia again.