We Are Called Dependents For A Reason

Over the past few days, I have been making due of Hotel Living. Meeting my neighbors, reading a book by the pool, and of course a little bit of swimming. As we enter the end of our fourth full week here in Italy, I noticed an attitude change in myself. 

I have become VERY unpleasant to my marito. It's almost like he can't do anything right in my eyes. He asks where do I want to go for dinner, and I roll my eyes at him and say "You Pick, I REALLY don't care." Like he deserved to be talked to like a child. Or a dog. It's a shame, we've been getting on each others last nerves for the past week, and I realize why.

No, it's not "that time of the month." It occurred to me that I have never been SO dependent on my marito in the 7 years we've been together, that my lack of independence is driving me insane! I've mentioned before how I am such a go-go-go person, and being locked up on a hotel with no where to go, nothing to do or places to see that I take out my frustrations on the man I married. 

I can't go shopping without his money, or without him driving me there, since I haven't learned to drive stick. I can't go to the gym unless I want to be stuck on base all day because I have to wait for a ride home from him when he gets off work. I truly understand the word dependent now more than ever. I had more freedom when I was 14!

Well today was my anniversary with my marito, and to get out of the hotel before I killed him (figuratively speaking) I signed up for a class on base yesterday. It was a demijohn decorating class. I needed to get my artsy fartsy on!

Before this class, I did drag marito out to the Support Site to check out a sidewalk sale the Thrift Store was having. The Thrift Store is ran by the Naples Overseas Spouse Club, which I really want to get more involved with. Everything they had outside was 50 Cents!! I wanted to go to find a steal! They had a ton of clothes, shoes, hats, books, even some electronics! Nothing that I needed but it was nice to find the Thrift Store, so when they have their grand re-opening I can stop by.

Now it was time for my demijohn class and it couldn't have come at a better time! Marito and I weren't seeing eye to eye and I needed to get my mind into craft mode. A lovely group of ladies met at the Community Center, we each got our own demijohn. A demijohn is a glass bottle that has a tear drop shape, and it comes in different colors. They are used to make wine, and can be found all over Italy. The Americans here are big into collecting them, and this was my easy way of starting my collection. We all took gems, colored glass, tiles and marbles and glued them to the bottle. filling in the holes with grout so the bottles had a mosaic look to them. Three hours into it and it was time to go. It was nice connecting with wives who have already settled into the life here, and making new friends. I left as one happy wife, and marito picked me up after he had gone anniversary gift shopping. So this was definitely a double win for me!

For our anniversary, we put the bickering behind us and spent the day at the pool, surrounded by our new friends and their kids. We had made plans to go see a movie, catch a sunset and maybe go out for dinner, but spending a few hours in the water and sun with good company was definitely the better choice!

I am fully aware of the deployment cycle but no one prepared me for the PCS cycle to an overseas station. I've been through the excited to move phase, and the hurry up let's get there phase. Now I am just hoping I am done with my "Claustrophobic  phase.