So.
When we last left off, Fighter Pilot Dude and I were engaged.
I had the ring.
The halo was finally attached.
I had the dress.
And, I had absolutely no idea what I had just signed up for.
But have you SEEN my dress?!
Anyway.
After our fabulous TOPGUN Dining Out weekend in Lake Tahoe, reality returned rather rudely.
I had to go back to Florida.
Fighter Pilot Dude stayed in Nevada because, you know…
TOPGUN. Fighter jets. Important pilot things. (Except – no volleyball scene…you know the one.)
So we went back to doing the long-distance relationship thing while trying to figure out what came next.
And what came next was:
I move to Nevada.
Not just me, obviously.
Me.
My two girls.
My dog.
My entire household.
All of my furniture.
Basically everything required to establish an actual functioning home because Fighter Pilot Dude had approximately…
Nothing.
Minor details.
So while I was mentally preparing to pack up my children, my house, my furniture, my dog, and my entire Florida life and haul it across the country to Nevada…
There was another tiny matter to address.
His children had to find out we were engaged.
And by “find out,” I mean…
notice the ring.
One morning, his daughter was at my house eating breakfast before school.
And she saw it.
The ring.
Not the temporary halo-less version either.
Oh no.
This baby was now fully operational.
Center diamond.
Halo.
Sparkle.
The whole situation.
She noticed it.
And…
Cue the meltdown.
Not a little “I’m upset about this” moment.
Fighter Pilot Dude eventually had to go pick her up from high school because she was having such a difficult time with the news.
And suddenly this engagement wasn’t just about two adults deciding to get married.
We had entered an entirely different arena.
Because then…
the soon-to-be ex-wife entered the chat.
And when I tell you the insults and jabs that went back and forth between those two were horrible…
They were horrible.
And THAT part was completely foreign to me.
Because my divorce hadn’t looked like that.
My girls’ father and I remained very good friends after we divorced. We had children together. We still had to raise them. We still had birthdays and school events and holidays and approximately 47,000 other things that required us to exist in the same universe.
We weren’t married anymore.
We didn’t have to hate each other about it.
That philosophy was not universally shared.
Because this?
This was WAR.
And I was standing there thinking:
What in the Jerry Springer military-spouse edition is happening right now?
I hadn’t even packed a box yet.
I was still in Florida.
My furniture hadn’t moved an inch.
And somehow my engagement ring had already caused an interstate incident.
Looking back, there were signs everywhere.
Not necessarily that a child was upset — because honestly, a child struggling with her father getting engaged made sense.
That deserved compassion.
The part I should have paid more attention to was everything happening around it.
The hostility.
The insults.
The constant conflict.
The inability for anything to happen without becoming a battle.
Because I was preparing to move my daughters into the middle of all of that.
At the time, though?
I thought we would figure it out.
Of course I did.
I was in love.
I was engaged.
I had a plan.
And — I cannot stress this enough —
HAVE YOU SEEN MY DRESS?!
Unfortunately, the dress was back in the closet.
And I was about to start packing.
For Nevada.
What could possibly go wrong?
Your Fairy Groundmother would like to remind everyone that this is a rhetorical question.
Until next time…xoxo
Tracy
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