So when I moved to Olympia, Washington three years ago I had no idea that my life was going to change. My sister told me to get a dog, within the first year I didn’t listen, but by the second year I was so lonely on this side of the world that I had no choice but to buy one. The dog kept me a little healthier, I was use to drinking in my room and just playing the game. I remember when a deer hit my car when I was headed to work, I drunk even more. My sister always tried to tell me that I shouldn’t drink, but I always told her that our grandfather was my role model, besides, I can attain disability anyway so I didn’t care about my mental health.

To make a long story short, I went through a bad depression. The depression hit year two month seven of being deployed in Washington. I thought I was going to be able to handle being away from my family on the East Coast, but as it turns out that was not the best decision at all. I got really, really homesick and I missed my mom so much. I wasn’t use to not being able to see her on the weekends like I was before, the plane tickets to live over here are through the roof so weekend trips were out. When the depression hit I started to drink so bad that I didn’t care about being to work on time, I just wanted to be with my mom. I found myself in my room crying, “mommy… mommy…” at the big age of 26. You would think that at 26 years old I was emotionally mature enough to handle myself, but I wasn’t. I found myself drinking, drowning in my sorrors and then showing up in a wrinkled uniform in the morning. There were times when my dog would want to go to the bathroom and I wasn’t really in the mood to take him out, but I always found a way to drink it all away.

Then the day came, the day where they placed the notice on my door because I got dishonorably discharged. They placed the notice on my door and then I found myself thinking, “this can’t be real life.” With a dishonorable discharge I wasn’t sure who was going to hire me and I couldn’t help but to feel like my entire life was sliding away. I wasn’t the type to work a normal job because I always had my game. I want a job, but what? My sister always told me to try IT, but IT wasn’t fun. Besides, who wants to be paid to click on boxes all day and just open up browsers? I stared at the notice on my door in disbelief that my life was really sliding down the drain this way. I wanted to get back to the old me, the me that did like being away from home, but that boy on the inside was long gone. I just blinked my eyes. I didn’t want to call my mom to tell her the bad news, I was missing her and I needed her. So what did I do? I called my sister… “Sis, I got a notice on the door.”

“What?”

“I got a notice on the door…” I sighed, “they putting me out.” I blinked my eyes and just thought about what she was going to say, better to break the news to her than my mom.

“Okay, when are you packing your stuff? Do you have savings?”

I just blinked again, “I’m going to pack it today, I’m not paying for this shit, fuck it. I want to come home.”

I could hear my sister’s annoyance on the other side of the phone, “whateverrr, okay, I’ll send for you. What about the furniture?”

“I don’t have money to move it, I’m just going to sell it. Don’t send for me, I want my car, I’m going to drive home.”

My sister sighed, “you said that before… so mommy doesn’t know?”

“Hell nah mommy don’t know, but I’ll be to you, just send me enough money to get to you.”

It didn’t take long for my sister to send me $500 to start the trip, that’s why I love her so much, she’s always in my corner. When I got off the phone I looked at the dog and the dog looked at me, “it’s time buddy…” and we got ready to get in the car.