Gettin' hitched.

With the way my family is, and with the way my friends are...with the way people are in general, this is the only place that I can safely talk about this. I'll tell them all eventually, but for now I just need to be alone with my decisions and my husband to be.

Austin and I have been toying around with the idea of getting married by a justice of the peace and having an actual ceremony later on. This isn't an uncommon practice in the military, what with relocations, extra allowances for members with dependents, all that jazz. Getting married before we had originally planned just kind of makes more sense.

I've been really stressed about moving to Portland with my best friend for a number of reasons.

1) She's terrible at managing money. She's always broke because she doesn't like to work, and doesn't try very hard to find a job, and when she has her boyfriends send her money, she doesn't save it or use it on important things. She buys long boards, or she goes out for expensive dinners.

2) She has this habit of befriending the scum of the earth and bringing them over to our apartment. This doesn't worry me so much here because Reno is an evil I know, but Portland isn't, and we won't know anybody, or the area, and I don't want her bringing random drug dealers into my home.

3) If I moved to Portland, Austin would be able to stay with me on his days off, but with traffic, it would be about a two hour commute. And he would have to leave at 4 in the morning on days he worked to get there on time, but he said he doesn't trust the traffic so he probably would just have to leave the night before. So that cuts considerably into the time we could spend together.

So after taking all of this into consideration, I talked to Jen and told her that I don't trust her with money, I know she's not going to have enough money to move when I want to go, I don't want to end up paying for everything, and I don't want to end up taking care of her.

She was surprisingly a lot better about it than I thought she would be. She told me, if I didn't want to move to Portland with her, she wouldn't be mad. She got into that car accident and now owes those people $1400, and she can hardly pay her rent as it is. So there's no way she's going to have any money saved up by August, even if she were to find an awesome full time job. Unless she takes up stripping. But that's a different story.

Anyway, talking to Jen and telling her I didn't want to move with her puts me in my own boat...alone. So I'm now contemplating moving to Portland alone. This is terrifying not only to me, but also to Austin. He told me "I don't feel comfortable with you living in Portland alone...but it's your decision, and I won't make it for you" (isn't he great?). But I agree wholeheartedly. So the entire day we spent looking at apartments in places like Hillsboro and Tigard; suburbs of Portland that are a little closer to Garibaldi, where he's stationed, and cut out A LOT of traffic time.

But then I'm thinking to myself. Well...there were two reasons I was moving to Oregon.
1) To go to school. 2) To be with Austin.

If I were to move to one of these suburbs alone, 1) I can't go to school until I get my residency 2) I wouldn't be with Austin. And I'd be alone. In a small town. Neat.

So I was starting to feel really down about moving. And I told Austin. And he was super bummed because he wants me to move really badly. He's been suggesting that I just move in with him, but this wouldn't really be possible until they let him out of the barracks and gave him BAH. And that doesn't look like it's happening any time soon. He said he could just get a place out of pocket, but I wouldn't want to do that to him either.

I was being sort of vague and coy about the whole thing, and I'm pretty sure it was giving him the impression that I just didn't want to live with him at all. And he was asking, why? Why are you so...gun ho against living with me? And I told him I was afraid that I was rushing into this without my head on straight. And he said he understood that.

After hours of beating around the bush...I just started to get really sad. He told me over and over again, all night, like he always tells me, I just want you to be happy. And I'm thinking to myself...I'm not happy. I want to do what makes me happy. And I closed my eyes and thought about what makes me happy. Being where I am right now doesn't make me happy. I'm around people that can't break out of the highschool/partying/random sex/drinking mentality. I'm working at a job that I absolutely hate so that I can pay for an apartment in a city that I also hate because it's big and dirty. I'm not with the man I love, and only get to have skype dates a few days a week. (Which I'm grateful for! I'm so happy to be able to talk to him at all. I know other branches of the military are way way worse.) And I'm taking care of my best friend because she can't take care of herself, and it stresses me out majorly. All of these things make me super unhappy.

And why am I opposed to living with him? Why am I opposed to moving to Tillamook to be with him? Because I'm afraid to take that leap. I'm afraid to be dependent on him for any length of time. And I might not be able to find a job for a while, and that will make me dependent on him. And that really scares me. And I don't want him to resent me for it, or think I'm trying to live off of him, or think I'm a total shitbag. That's what I'm afraid of. And I don't know why I won't just tell him that.

But anyway. We're talking...and I realize all these things. And I think...what makes me happy, what will make me happy? Because I'm really unhappy with where I am right now. Well, being with Austin would make me happy, living in a new place and starting our home and life together would make me happy, not having to babysit/take care of my best friend would make me happy. And so Austin is saying to me "We should watch tv together" and I say "We should get married" a split second after. And there's a moment of silence. And he says "What?" and I say "...well...we should just get married." And he goes "Baby, I am down to JoP it up whenever you are. I love you."

And then he asks "But why the change of heart? It seemed like you were really down on getting married and living together." and I told him, "No, I always wanted those things. I'm just afraid to make that leap. I'm afraid of too much too soon I guess. What if you don't love me forever?" and he goes "I will. I wake up every single morning with you on my mind, missing you like crazy. All I want is to go to bed holding you and wake up to your face. I will never stop loving you." and then he goes, "I'm so excited that you want to do this! That you're excited about this now."

So...we're going to get married by a justice of the peace when he comes to visit on July 3rd, if we can squeeze it in haha. He's got a lot of people to see while he's here. That's a Saturday and the office is open 9-4 on Saturdays. And I looked it up and all we need to do is fill out an application for a marriage license (which I printed offline and filled out) and take it to the Courthouse and pay $75 for the marriage license, and then get a JoP to say a few words in the presence of 2 witnesses, and then we all sign the document, we pay the JoP like $40, and we're Mr. and Mrs. B.

We're probably crazy. We've known each other for 3 months (officially. I had a HUGE crush on him in high school, and to him I was Phil's cute friend), and we've been together for two and a half. And by the time we actually get married, we'll have been together for 3. But...I've never been so sure about anything in my life. I love him, and I know without a shadow of a doubt that he loves me and will be faithful to me for the rest of our lives. I love him so much, and I knew from the moment I laid eyes on him (upon meeting AFTER highschool haha) that he was the one for me. That was it. And I told him two weeks later that I knew he was the man I was going to marry. I even told my mom. And all she said was "Yeah? So he did in two weeks what Leo couldn't do in a year, huh?" because any time the M word would get mentioned with Leo I would immediately back away and tell him to just enjoy the time we had together. I would basically run screaming, pulling out my own hair.

But I drove through Garibaldi and had lunch with Austin and the moment he walked into the coffee shop I thought, that's going to be my husband someday. I've always loved him.

I know this is super sappy and stuff but...screw it, it's my blog, and these are my beans, and I'm getting freaking married! I'm excited, and in love.

Two months from now I'll be married, living with my husband.

My mom is getting re-married on August 14th. So I'm going to stay in Nevada until after that. I'm probably going to move the last week of August still. I need to sell my car still, and save up some money. I want to have at least $1500 squirreled away. Basically just money to pay my phone bill, because the government will pay our rent and give us $320 a month for food. And then he'll have like $1400 in basic pay to just spend on whatever. (and by spend on whatever, I mean for us to SAVE.) He's not the...greatest with money. It's not that he's stupid about money, it's just that he likes to spend money, and he's very generous. Which is a good thing, we just have to be smart about it. Honestly, the military is an awesome way to save money. I mean they give you free rent and money for food every month. So especially if you don't have kids, you get to save like, all your money pretty much.

I'm also going to make him get a credit card. 21 years old and the man doesn't have a credit card. Really? How in the world are we ever going to be able to do anything if we don't have credit? Well, I do. I have good credit. But he has...no credit...and that's sketch as fuck. If I do say so myself. I'll probably be in charge of financial matters. I'm really good with money, and I'm really financially smart. I want to start putting money into our retirement fund! It's crazy...he retires in like 20 years. We're still going to be so young.

Anyway...I kinda got off track here. Like, way off track. but it's my blog and these are my beans!

So we're moving to Tillamook. Which is about 20 minutes away from his station, and where most of his coast guard buddies live. And I'm going to just live and (hopefully) work for about a year to get my residency. And then I'm going to get my associates from Tillamook Community College (I only have about a semester more to go, depending on how many of my credits actually transfer...so probably 2 semesters, darn). Then hopefully he'll find out where his A-School is going to be by then so I can figure out where I'm going to transfer to get my bachelor's degree. I probably won't be done with school for about four or five more years. I'm going to get my teaching license so I can teach high school English. I'm really excited about it!

He wants to start having kids like a year after we get married (because he's insane and apparently likes sleep deprivation and not having sex) but I want to wait until after I get my teaching license. Because I want to stay home with the kids, and then I'd never get to go back to school. This way, I can get my license, maybe work for a year, get my feet wet. Then stay home with my kids, and then after they start school I can start working again. Rather than having to just go back to school (again) and then go to work. I want to start working and saving towards our future too.

I'm so excited to start our life together.
As soon as I move up he's buying me a St. Bernard that we're naming Bostwick.
And I'm going to plant a garden. :)
He said he'd build me a picket fence.

I can't find a single house for rent in Tillamook online though! It's ridiculous. He's just going to have to find us a place I suppose. Or maybe I'll fly up at the end of July and stay for one of his three day weekends and we can look then.

Alright. Longest post ever. I'm off to bed.