Wives of this post, you've got a choice.

Today again, some wife told me I'm in denial for thinking this place isn't bad as far as assignments go. OK, first of all, I'm not even going to touch the fact that between me and Thak, someone in this family has been assigned to almost every major post there is, and we both find this one to be a halfway decent assignment. Is it perfect? No way. We hate the weather, and we REALLY hate the way people drive here. Plus, it's pretty hard to find foods we like sometimes, and the only good grocery store is all the way on the other side of the metro area. Once you get beyond all that, though, this is actually a damned good assignment as far as assignments go. I have not yet seen a "No GI's" sign on a business, and believe me, when I was a young soldier, I saw those all the time in places I was stationed. I've yet to have someone try to rip me off and screw me out of a bunch of money here, and we have had that happen (they'd try. They wouldn't succeed.) at every other post either one of us has ever been assigned to. The rents here are starting to rise commensurate with housing allowance, but it's nowhere near the level that something like Ft. Stewart or Ft. Hood experiences this every single year (although Ft. Stewart had rent control, which was nice). At every other post either of us has been assigned to, there has been a definite feel of "Hey, GI. Gimme your money, and I'll give you some cut rate shit." at just about every business in town. Here, there is none of that.

The fact is, this place has good stuff in it. You just have to find it. Yeah, the public schools are shit, but there are like five charter schools which are some of the top schools in Texas. If you can swing it financially, or you're Catholic, the private school options are endless. You don't have to take what the school districts are dishing out, and with all the options available, I question the sanity of anyone who has a problem with the public schools, and sticks with them in spite of it all.

Yeah, the Army hospital is a real piece of crap. I've never set foot in it, and I never will. Thak has. That's enough. You don't have to go there if you don't want to. Un-register from Tricare Prime, keep Tricare Standard, and go anywhere in town. You have a choice. If you have that much of a problem with the Army hospital, then find your way out. It's not that hard. It took me roughly 5 minutes of my time, plus the two days it took the postal service to carry my forms to Atlanta. It's not difficult at all. You can improve your life that way.

Granted, I don't know anything about the predatory practices of some of the apartment complexes around here. I don't live in an apartment, and the people we hang out with don't either, so it's not something I hear about. If it's that bad, though, get on the post housing list. You'll have a maximum of two years to deal with it, probably less. That's really not that bad. Plus, if it's THAT bad, then you can go ahead and report the complex or landlord to the post housing office's off post referral center, and if they get enough complaints, they will blacklist them so no soldiers can lease from them anymore. Nobody in a military town wants to be blacklisted on post, so they'll do pretty much anything to avoid it. Get the highest ranking person you know to go and talk to them in no uncertain terms, and they'll fix what's wrong in about 99% of cases. In the other 1%, your chain of command can surely get you out of your lease. I've seen multiple Lieutenant Colonels work miracles with this kind of thing. If it's that bad, invoke your chain of command. You have options. Don't act like you don't.

Also, be realistic. If your husband is a Private, of course you can't afford anything here. You wouldn't be able to afford anything anywhere. It's pretty universal that lower-enlisteds scrape by barely, and usually live in bad neighborhoods, Sergeants scrape by in decent neighborhoods, and Staff Sergeants and above do fine. (No really, you should see the jump in housing allowance between Sergeants and Staff Sergeants. It's hundreds of dollars a month.) This is a fact of the Army, and you have to live with the ramifications of what you marry. I'm not sorry that my husband is of a rank that allows us to live in a good neighborhood, in a house that's plenty big enough, and that because of this, I don't think this is a horrible assignment that should be made an unaccompanied hardship tour like Korea used to be. (Yes, one wife actually said that. Me and all my peers were literally speechless.) I'm not sorry that you chose to marry someone without enough rank to get you a good place to live. It simply isn't my problem. I do not appreciate being told that I'm in denial if I think this place isn't so bad once you figure out your way around it.

I mean, tell me what's bad about it for me. I live in a pretty 3 BR house with big rooms and a big yard, in an established neighborhood. My daughter goes to the best school we have ever seen, and is getting a better education than any other kid we know. We live less than 10 miles from Thak's work, and he comes home for every meal. He's able to go to school at night and get himself all ready to get out of the Army when the time comes. We're able to have our last baby at home, and we have found a midwife who is absolutely amazing, and who is totally working with us on every single thing we want and need out of the situation. Our kids' pediatrician rocks. There's a grocery store here that sells free range organic meats and lots of organic produce, as well as other products we use. If this city had a cloth diapering retailer and a large upscale baby store where we could shop gear that we actually like, then we'd lack absolutely nothing.

Beyond the weather and the drivers, what's so bad, really? It takes a while to get the hang of any post and learn your way around all the good stuff. It especially takes a while to find your kind of people in a city this huge. Once you one or both of those things, though, it's really easy to like most places at least on some level. (Geez.... I'm kinda good at this Army crap, huh? Yet mine is the one getting out, while these others will reenlist until the cows come home. Irony.)