Future Kaby

Dear Future Ka, I have been receiving your future emails everyday since you left for Iraq and they make my day. With everything that you have done for me, I figured that I should start writing to you now. It is kind of therapeutic in a way and helps bridge the gap of time between the emptiness while you are gone and the thought of you returning home to me and Lucy. I specifically picked the beginning of November because I know it is going to be a long month waiting for you to come home. I am already counting the days. It has been 14 days since you left me and it has not gotten any easier. I know it is pitiful, but I spend the whole day anticipating my Skype calls with you and take joy in making care packages. Every time I pick something out for your care packages, I feel closer to you and get excited thinking about you opening them and being happy. The sad part is that we are both exhausted when we do get a chance to talk. You are tired from waking up early in the morning and I am just heading to bed. Hopefully soon, we will have the schedule down. But, I would take the bad reception phone calls any day over last week when I couldn't reach you. I freaked out! I thought there had been another mortar attack and you were hurt. It turned out that the only thing wrong was the internet was down. I felt really silly, but I can't help but be worried. I don’t know how bad it is there. I never know if you are hiding things that are happening so that I will not be upset. I wish I was as strong as you and could handle more. I begrudgingly bought another draft protector for the kitchen door. I hate how the thing always jams when you are opening or shutting the door, but the Terminix guy said that it would help with the mice problem. Hopefully when you are reading this in November, Lucy and I will not be living with Mickey Mouse, Minnie Mouse, Jerry, Mighty Mouse, Speedy Gonzales, and all of their descendants. Maybe I should have rethought the whole cat thing! : ) They just started construction on the Rhode Island Metro project. I wonder how far the building will be underway when you return. I was researching the renovations online and they are anticipating this being completed Fall of 2011. I can’t wait! I really hope this will add value to our home and renovate the neighborhood. I am so worried that we will not be able to sell the house and I really want to live overseas. I think about our Italy trip all of the time and I could really see us being Europeans. Just think we already own the scooter! With you coming home soon, have you thought of any neat places you want to travel? It is kind of sad how we will miss our Anniversary this year. I hope I still made it special for you. You are so special to me and it is hard to top or show you each year how much I love you. I can’t believe that it will be four years in October. FOUR YEARS! In some ways it seems like it went by so fast and in other ways it seems like I can’t remember a time without you. It is sad to think how quickly time goes by. Lucy and I went for a Sunday walk to the Farmer’s Market yesterday. I think back to when we first got Lucy together from the kennel. She is not that same puppy any more. She is starting to get older. I can see the grey forming around her eyes and the strain she has sometimes on her back leg when she is walking down the stairs. It is hard to see this. In my head, I only see you, me, and Lucy the way we have always been and I guess in 20 or 40 years I will still see you as the man I married. But after stepping back, I realize that we have grown up and changed so much. I am scarred to think that you may have changed while we are apart. I wonder who you will be in November. Will you have seen things that I will never understand? Will you miss your lifestyle in Iraq and not want to come home to me? Will my petty problems seem insignificant to what you have experienced? Are you going to still want to be with me when you return? But the one question I always know the answer to is that I love you. I love you. I love you. By writing you this email, I feel like I am closer to the Kalib who is coming home in a couple of weeks. Not the Kalib who just left me. In a way, it makes me hopeful that the time is not really that long.