[aldaron327]

This is gonna go a little long. I apologize in advance.

I used to fly AH-64Ds in the Army. I had just come back to the States after 3 years stationed in Germany. A week after I signed into my new unit, I was directed to attend some training down at Ft. Rucker (having just been stationed at Ft. Riley). I left to attend that training and on my ex-wife's Birthday (feb 14th), I got a call from her while I was on a break from class. She told me that she was leaving and wasn't coming back. I spent the next 4 weeks of training going through the motions and had found out that my ex drove half way across the country to hook up with some guy she met on the internet. That ended that one for me. I got a lawyer and had all the paperwork ready to go when I got back to Kansas. Upon my return, my fellow pilots from my Company grabbed onto me and took me out for a night on the town. That night, Amber and I met very briefly, but I was wiped out from a long drive, emotional drainage, and waaaaay too much alcohol. She was in a similar boat, so other than exchanging a smile (half-hearted on my part), we didn't interact.

I woke up the next morning at my buddy's house (we got a cab back to his place and I slept on his couch) and got all my stuff together and headed home, planning fully on sleeping off the remainder of the horrendous hangover I had. I also planned on staying home that night to try and get my house in order since my household goods arrived from Germany while I was gone and my ex just dumped all the boxes out into the living room floor to get her stuff out of them.

As I sat there on Saturday afternoon in the midst of a pile of junk, I got a call from my buddy. He was grabbing dinner with some friends and wanted to make sure that I got something to eat. I reluctantly went out with them and then we went back to another buddy's place to have a "driveway drunk". I swung back by my house and picked up one of my acoustic guitars for something to do while I sat there semi-miserable. Around midnight, we'd run out of beer and were trying to figure out how to get more. That's when one of the guys that was there who knew Amber called her. She was at a BBQ with some other friends and was looking for an excuse to get out of there, so she showed up with some beer.

I had spent the majority of the night drinking and being that "weird, lonely guy" in the corner just playing my guitar. When she walked in, something inside me woke up. I got up from playing and introduced myself. She said that she remembered me from the night before and I was surprised. The rest of the guys were intent on drinking more, so Amber and I sat down and started talking. She really liked my TBSS and wanted to sit in it, so we hopped in and I showed her around it. We sat there with the sunroof open and the radio going and just talked and it was like every broken piece of my life no longer existed. Every wound I ever suffered was suddenly gone. My ex-wife was like a chapter that had been torn out of my book. We talked until the sun came up and we'd long since been sober. We went back to my place and took a nap together for a while. When we got up, she invited me to go to the movies with her and some friends, so I went. We spent that night together too. We talked all night again. I met up with her every night after that and we started dating after my divorce was finalized.

I spent the next several months with her until I deployed to Iraq on September 3rd of 2007. While deployed I talked to her (thanks, satellite internet!) almost every single day and spent the majority of my R&R Leave with her. I got home on November 20th 2008 and we got married at the courthouse on December 15th 2008. We had a full ceremony with family on June 6th of 2009. She's my absolute best friend and a stunningly beautiful wife and mother. Oh yeah, we had our first baby on September 3rd of 2010. 3 years after we had to be apart for a while.

whew, that WAS long-winded.