"What are you doing?"  The new cashier looked puzzled as her trainer walked over to the register and stuffed handfuls of leftover Halloween candy stock into my grocery bags.

"It's ok," she replies, "I KNOW her!  She's got kids!  LOTS of kids. You give these to your babies.  They'll eat them!" Then she pressed a piece of chocolate into the palm of my hand.  "You take this one. I want you to eat this one in the car on your way home now."

Though we have privileges at a large military commissary I often prefer to shop at the smaller grocery store closer to home.  There are fewer cashiers and fewer options and sometimes that's really a nice thing.  It's a quick grocery trip versus an outing, an event.  Since we eat a whole lot there are many quick trips over the course of a year, especially during sports seasons when the boys play right around the corner. We have become regulars and now when we check out they ask about whichever children are not with me.  When I left my ID card in the car last time, my favorite clerk waved me on.  

"I KNOW you!"

In our experience it takes about two years in a place to reach this point of really knowing and being known.  Two years means you see familiar faces at the store.  Two years means you get halfway to your destination and notice the GPS is in the other car and it's no big deal.  Two years means your kid probably knows at least one other kid on the team at the beginning of the season.  Thing is, if you are a military mom, two years also often means the clock is ticking and next year this time it will reset itself in a new place. 

That is probably what got me all whimpery and teary eyed reading this today: 

“But I won’t have any friends there. We don’t know anyone there,” my older daughter cried…. I swallowed hard. When we think of leaving it is not: can we take our favorite couch? It is not: how big is my new bedroom? It is not: does the neighborhood have a pool?  When we think of leaving, the faces of those we will desperately miss is what immediately comes to mind.  When it’s time to say goodbye, we are powerfully reminded that the most important things in life aren’t things.  And just like me, my children instantly felt the need for familiar faces—people who know us."

It's that.  

It's that which makes me hesitate for a half second when people proclaim how we have aaaaallllll the luck and how they'd love to go on vacation so many places. The thing is, this isn't vacation – where you leave all the regular stuff in its regular place and then return back to it.  It's a stepping out into a vast unknown.  It's about trying to find a dentist who understands the one child who doesn't like novacaine, finding a house that is wheelchair friendly and will allow that scruffy rescue dog because your kids have had enough goodbyes. It is figuring out where there is a good piano teacher.  It's about getting a doctor up to speed on who has had what. It's about locating that perfect team so kids can plug back into community. It's about praying fervently that those connections are made sooner vs later, ending that awful in-between time of not knowing and not being known.  

We are so very blessed.  When a meme floated around urging people to get out of their comfort zone, befriend folks who don't share your first language, are not your same age, etc I thought well, we have that one down pat.  That is our life!  It's worth every bit of the effort it has required.  It does require a fair amount of gumption though.  

Military moms will tell you so.  They will tell you of kids crying across the country on flights to new homes.  About kids sitting on beds surrounded by boxes announcing with certainty that there are NO friend options in this new place, that it will NEVER be like the last place.  They will tell you about all the encouraging things you counter with, while inside you are secretly thinking the very same things.  

They will also say they know in their heart of hearts that there is always an email, an invitation, a mutual friend, a compassionate new neighbor.  There is always eventually a hand extended in welcome.  We are in that stage right now, reassuring each other and reminding of all those wonderful ways things have fallen together in other places.  EVERY other place.  As wrenching as it always is to leave, there will come a day when the new place is as dear to us.  It is hard to see that on the leaving end, but it is true.  

I have a small chocolate wrapper in my hand to prove it.