Having sent zix off on sunday, I'm now devoid of so many of those dear to me. I miss each and every one of them terribly, but I know that really, what I feel is nothing compared to what they are facing. Although it's true that I'm experiencing a tougher time in the army, I still have my family to go home to every weekend and sometimes (like now) for long periods of time. And although they've already made friends and more or less settled down (or at least tried their best to) in their own new environments, it's going to take a lot more time for them to feel totally comfortable and at ease. And that's not forgetting that even with the connection that online communication provides, nothing beats physical presence and accompaniment. I think it would be really hard for me to be apart from my family for such long periods of time. (they're mostly only going to come back in June next year!!)

I'd say we all have to learn to change and to adapt for nearly our entire lifespan. Just as I'm slowly settling into officer cadetship in echo wing, they're acclimatizing themselves to how their schools are run; how their roommates and the people they hang out with function; and the nearly-completely different cultures that these distant places possess. And being nineteen year old girls fresh out of junior college, they have to deal with the standard hormonal, relational, emotional issues that we've all been dealing with for our student life. All the more so that they're in a permanent institution a good four or five years, it's no surprise then that they'd start thinking about finding their future partners more so than those of us here who think that we've got more time to spare. Besides, they're probably coming back here anyway, so the time is ripe indeed. To that, all I can say is that I hope they manage to find someone who makes them happy and loves them unconditionally, more so with each passing day. There is nothing more important than the feeling of sheer happiness that you can get when you're with someone, and it's rare and precious to find somehing like that.

I've been quite the lucky boy all my life, other than in one niggling area that is really quite disheartening but irrelevant at this point in time so I shall not ruin my happy block leave by thinking about it (: and it may be just my inner leonidas speaking, but like how cheo puts it, this is a rite of passage, rich in memories and experiences. It will toughen us mentally, and we will steel ourselves physically. We learn a myriad of skills, quite a few of which we can translate into our lives in the future. And anybody who misses out on the rapid mental development and acceleration of one's maturity (when the time calls for it, of course. I'm still very much full of it most of the time ^^) is, really, deprived of that life-changing experience. That spark that ignites an evolution within them. The homogeneous issue that all (most) of us can relate to and talk about, way into our elder years.

There's only so much difference between a day job and JC life. Although I miss school so much such that the books might as well be comics and the teachers might as well all be megan fox, I'm glad that I'm not spending another two years of my life in an adult version of JC.