Guest Blogger - A Little Pink in a World of Camo

Hello there, I'm Mrs. P from A Little Pink in a World of Camo and I'll be your lovely blog host today! A little about me... well, I'm a Marine Gold Star Wife (or for those who have never heard that term, like me before I became as such, a Marine Corps widow). I'm 23 and have one little girl who, in my belief, is the most beautiful thing on the planet, but hey, I could be biased. Oh, I also tend to over use commas.

Today, I'm going to talk about unity but I'm going to open up with a few jokes. Please take these jokes as they are supposed to be - funny - and don't become offended. Any branch can be replaced with another to make that joke for your own branch, and it will all make sense in the end, promise.

** A Marine and a Soldier are in the bathroom using the urinals. After doing their business, the soldier goes to the sink to wash his hands and notices the Marine heading for the door without doing so. The Soldier says to the Marine, "In the Army, they teach us to wash our hands after we pee." The Marine replies, "Well, in the Marine Corps, they teach us not to pee on our hands."


** A Sailor is driving from Miramar to Camp Pendleton, and a Marine is driving from Camp Pendleton to Miramar. In the middle of the night with no other cars on the road they hit each other head on and both cars go flying off in different directions.
The Marine manages to climb out of his car and surveys the damage. He looks at his twisted car and says, "Man, I am really lucky to be alive!"
Likewise, the Sailor scrambles out of his car and looks at his wreckage. He too says to himself, "I can't believe I survived this wreck!"
The Sailor walks over to the soldier and says, "Hey man, I think this is a sign from God that we should put away our petty differences and live as friends instead of archrivals"
The Marine thinks for a moment and says, "You know, you're absolutely right! We should be friends. Now I'm gonna see what else survived this wreck"
So the Marine pops open his trunk and finds a full, unopened bottle of Jack Daniels.
He says to the Sailor, "I think this is another sign from God that we should toast to our new found understanding and friendship"
The Sailor replies, "You're damn right!" and he grabs the bottle and starts sucking down Jack Daniels. After putting away nearly half the bottle the Sailor hands it back to the Marine and says, "Your turn!"
The Marine twists the cap back on the bottle and says, "Nah, I think I'll wait for the cops to show up."

**Two Marines boarded a quick shuttle flight out of Dallas, headed for Houston. One sat in the window seat, the other sat in the middle seat.

Just before take-off, an Army soldier got on and took the aisle seat next to the two Marines.

The Soldier kicked off his shoes, wiggled his toes and was settling in when the Marine in the window seat said, "I think I'll get up and get a coke." "No problem," said the Soldier, "I'll get it for you."

While he was gone, the Marine picked up the Soldier's shoe and spit in it. When the Soldier returned with the coke, the Marine in the middle seat said, "That looks good, I think I'll have one too."

Again, the Soldier obligingly went to fetch it and while he was gone, the Marine picked up the soldier's other shoe and spit in it. The Soldier returned and they all sat back and enjoyed the rest of the short flight to Houston.

As the plane was landing, the Soldier slipped his feet into his shoes and knew immediately what had happened.

"How long must this go on?" the Soldier asked.

"This fighting between our services? This hatred? This animosity? This spitting in shoes and peeing in cokes?"

(Yeah, I know I made them so they all had Marines, but like I said, I'm a proud Marine Wife! And hey, the Marines got it in the last one, ok?!)

Anyway, the point of all this is...

Aren't we all on the same team?
Yeah, the jokes are funny (at least I think so) and yeah it's fun to be proud of your branch and 'know' you're the best, but when is it too much? As wives, we represent our husbands in the military (I can't seem to get that through some people's heads, but it's the truth, like it or not) and often times, we find ourselves falling into the same pattern.
"Well my husband's tougher because he's a Marine"
"Well my husband's smarter because he's a Corpsmen"
"I have the best husband because he is a soldier"
"No, my Coastie is the best and bravest"
"No, my airmen is clearly better than all of yours"

One thing I've found through the milblogging community, to my great delight, is an awesome sense of unity. It seems people here really get it - we're all military spouses (girlfriends, fiancees, significant others...). After my husband died, I was blown away by the mass amounts of support I got from not only bloggers but people who weren't bloggy friends who happened to read from all branches of military (as well as civilians, but I'm focusing on branches here today, not to discredit civilians they're wonderful people too, it's just not my focus, don't make me lose my train of thought!). I just want to encourage this to continue, because it is just great. I have friends who are spouses (or other kinds of significant others) from each branch of the service, Marine Wives, Army Wives, Navy Wives, Airforce Wives, and Coast Guard Wives. And while I've met people from all branches, including my own, that I didn't like, I've met far more from all branches that were awesome. We are already at war with other nations which is taking the lives of our military, let's not be at war with ourselves too.

It saddens me when I hear about wives who have been put down because of their husband's branch of service - they should be commended for being a milwife no matter what branch, because it's tough on us all! And ya know, having grown up an Army brat and then marrying into the Marine Corps I realize that it's not all that different. Our men are all putting their lives out there on the line, some how, some way, and our lives are all hectic, some how, some way, by following and supporting our men.

My husband and I used to joke around about the differences all the time. While I am a super de-duper proud Marine Wife (OORAH!!) I would tease him about "The Army Way" and he would of course always assure me that the Marine Corps was the best. And while there are jokes out there, remember, they're jokes. They're supposed to be funny. They're not meant to be taken seriously. Don't take life too seriously, no one gets out alive.

So, I hope I gave you all a chuckle, as you arranged the jokes to put your branch as the "winning" one in the punch line, and maybe even a chuckle for your husbands as well! But please remember, unity - we are all on the same team - America (F- Yeah! ... anybody seen Team America? Love it. Hahaha)

Good night and God Bless,
Semper Fi
Mrs. P