Sisterly love

Dear Cass,
It is already 3:30 in the morning for me on Holy Thursday. I can't believe that Holy Week is here already, and almost gone. I try to say my rosary at night when I'm in my rack, but I'm so tired that I don't think I even finish the first decade before I'm fast asleep. There is Holy Thursday Mass tonight at 1700, so I'm going to go. I already told my supervisor that I might be late for work. In my opinion, this comes first. Good Friday services are at 1500, so I'll have to get up super early, and Easter Vigil is at 1700 on Saturday… again, probably will be late for work. Easter Sunday Mass is at 0830, and I'll not have gone to bed yet, so I'll be able to attend that as well. It's this week every year that makes me truly miss being home. I haven't attended Tenebrae in five years at least, and haven't sung a reading in eight. Really, just thinking about it brings tears to my eyes. You have no idea how much I miss it; it's rather heartbreaking. I keep swallowing the urge to cry, and it's only giving me a headache. Soon, the days will have passed, and I'll have another year to pass until I feel this sorrow again.
I keep thinking about how I need to keep the Blessed Sacrament company tomorrow night (or tonight rather) and that I can't because I have to work. How insignificant this all seems to me when I think of that. I mean, it's not insignificant, but my heart just takes over sometimes, as much as I try to keep it in check. It just doesn't ever want to listen; but I rule it with an iron fist.
I need to go see if I can't stencil one of my nice white spare jerseys (turtleneck, or what have you) so that I have a nice clean flightdeck uniform to wear to the chapel (civilian clothes aren't authorized unless we're in port). What a depressing thought… that I'll be wearing camouflage pants, steeltoe boots and a white turtleneck with my squadron and shop stenciled on it to Holy Week services, and Easter Mass. ='(
Good Night, I miss you.
Love, Dayna
P.s. You could always read my emails to you to mom, since she's having a hard time using her hands to get on the computer.


Dear Dayna Poo,
I know how you feel about Holy Week :( I have class on Thursday and work, so I cant go to Mass. I might just skip work, but I really need the hours you know? It's annoying. I'm sorry you can't dress up for mass, that is sad :( But just think of yourself as a soldier of Christ :) Well I know what you mean about the insignificance, but in the eyse of God it is insignificant when related to the worship of his son, but in relation to the world of course its not insignificant. "Who best/ bear his mild yoke they serve him best. His state/ Is Kingly. Thousands at his bidding speed/ and post o'er land and ocean without rest:/ They also serve who only stand and wait." :)I will try to read some of your emails to mom, but im hardly over there. So yeah. School is crazy right now, getting too close to finals. I had a metaphysics midterm today that i didnt know about -- I walked in and everyone is quiet and writing... Im like ummmm lol... oh well :) I imagine i did alright anyhow :) Keep my in your prayers,
Love, Cassie



Dear Dayna Smayna,
Well I havent much to say lol. Just thought I'd drop a line or two to say hello. Same old same old here. Two weeks of school left. Summer will be good, too bad I'm not independently wealthy. There is a St. Bernard in our office. Big Dog. Little Office. Good times :P. You haven't written in your blog or journal 'sup with that? I haven't done much either in that area. Oh well! So much for my literature ambitions hehe :D Alright, well Im going home.
Au Revoir,
Cass



I'm glad you write, even if it's just a little bit, you know....
It seems to me that it is roughly nine in the morning there... so I'm guessing that you're not yet at school. However, I don't quite remember which days you are taking classes and at which hours. Of course, I could always (and most likely will when I'm done with this) open up the email in which you detailed your schedule (pronounce shed-jewel, lol) and refresh my memory.
I haven't been writing, because work has really been hell for for us lately. I've heard many saying that work wise, this is the worst cruises they've ever been on. I was reflecting yesterday though, that despite all that, I'm rather enjoying this cruise. Guess it helps that I'm one of those freaks that just loves to work. Lol.
Oh and also speaking of writing, I did actually write something the other day, while I was daydreaming after my shift had ended, and I was sitting in the shop avoiding the hour dedicated to cleaning the berthing. Rofl. I will retrieve it and put it in my blog shortly after I send this email.
How I miss you! I am so very lonely out here ='( I have my couple really good friends, Sam and Mike; but Mike is leaving in a couple weeks (not that I see him much anyways, since he works days). And I try to eat midrats and morning chow with Sam, but don't always get to do so since her work schedule and mine don't correspond all that well. I'm the only girl on my shift, the other girl in my shop works days... so going to chow with Sam is what I get in the way of very necessary girl-time, you know?
I have my MP3 player hooked up to the surround sound here in the ready room, and the song currently playing is Paper Bag by Anna Nalick. How I love her music!
Well, I guess I'll write more later.
Que je t'aime avec tout mon coeur!
Daynabo

Day 53

Hmmm, day 53. Not sure if it actually sounds as long as it feels. I stepped foot on dry land a couple days ago, and today is my duty day, and tomorrow, I will go out to town and go shopping! =)
Port is such a relief... mentally, physically, emotionally. We all really needed this! They have been slave driving us. No, really. But I am glad to finally get enough sleep, and will be ready to get back to the daily grind when the time comes.

Day 1

Today is our first official day of cruise... The first of many days... five months.
We're doing carrier quals for flight ops the first two days, as is usual... but oh so boring. And my right knee in particular already hurts =( Luckily however, I bought a couple sets of Dr. Scholls for-her 16-hour-workdays insoles, and let me tell you that wow there is such a huge difference. My feet hurt, but not nearly as much as they would without them. Thank goodness I got them!

Currently I am sitting at the desk in the ready room standing the ASDO watch. 2400 to 0800. So boring! I'd rather be working on the jets. However, it does give me a good opportunity to update my blog as well as write letters to my friends and family. I've also been tasked with sweeping and mopping the floor. So pretty much just stuff to keep me busy. And as soon as Lopez gets back with tommorow's flight schedule, I' ll set about writing it on the white board here.

I'm working night check which means I arrive in my shop around 1730 and leave around 0630. The days are pretty long, and there's no break, really, until we pull into port. We work monday through sunday. When we pull into port we get three or four days off, but one of those days will most certainly be a duty day. On those days, we can't leave the ship and continue to work the maintenance that has been laid out for us, as well as standing watches.

Well, I'm going to start working on that letter writing....

Sailor, where art thou?

I love Rudyard Kipling... His book, Captains Courageous is what first inspired me to want to become a sailor, at the age of eleven...

I still have that copy, with my sixth-grade handwritten signature on the first page.

This summer, when my squadron, and several other squadrons with whom we work, including CAG, were working in Fallon Nv, I met another sailor about my age who also loves Rudyard Kipling.

He emailed me a poem by said author, and loving it, I now present it to you.



[IF]

If you can keep your head when all about you
Are losing theirs and blaming it on you,
If you can trust yourself when all men doubt you
But make allowance for their doubting too,
If you can wait and not be tired by waiting,
Or being lied about, don't deal in lies,
Or being hated, don't give way to hating,
And yet don't look too good, nor talk too wise:

If you can dream--and not make dreams your master,
If you can think--and not make thoughts your aim;
If you can meet with Triumph and Disaster
And treat those two impostors just the same;
If you can bear to hear the truth you've spoken
Twisted by knaves to make a trap for fools,
Or watch the things you gave your life to, broken,
And stoop and build 'em up with worn-out tools:

If you can make one heap of all your winnings
And risk it all on one turn of pitch-and-toss,
And lose, and start again at your beginnings
And never breath a word about your loss;
If you can force your heart and nerve and sinew
To serve your turn long after they are gone,
And so hold on when there is nothing in you
Except the Will which says to them: "Hold on!"

If you can talk with crowds and keep your virtue,
Or walk with kings--nor lose the common touch,
If neither foes nor loving friends can hurt you;
If all men count with you, but none too much,
If you can fill the unforgiving minute
With sixty seconds' worth of distance run,
Yours is the Earth and everything that's in it,
And--which is more--you'll be a Man, my son!


--Rudyard Kipling

hmph

"you're so ate up with the military" you said to me. And maybe you didn't mean the way i took it. But i felt it was mean and quite a low blow.
I'm sorry that's the life you decided to leave to persue school and then a big huge question mark after that!
The military is what I have and really all I've got. So piss off.
I will be great and I will make it. Re-enlisting is something I did to provide myself with the opportunity to make some of my dreams a reality.

So there.
what you said today hurt my feelings; but it opened my eyes too. Whether or not you meant it is no matter.

what will happen will happen... you know: que sera sera!

On that note...

Goodnight

"I want to spend the rest of my life with my best friend" is what she wrote. Wow. This is in fact a beautiful reality that I have seen with my own eyes. And honestly, if your spouse doesn't become your best friend, then maybe that person shouldn't be your spouse... i dunno, but that's a thought that strikes a very deep chord in my heart.

This not at all what i intended to write today, but after reading her blog i had to comment in mine on that.

You're right you know. And much of what you said gave me alot to think about... i will write more on this subject later.

And what I was going to write earlier, i will do that later also.

In the mean time, I need to take my belongings to the ship. We're going out for com2x. joy.