Richard Marx: Harbinger of depression.

Enormous head, tiny body.

So, I hit the deployment wall last week. Anyone who's been through a deployment knows what I'm talking about. It's that point where you're done. The deployment isn't over, but you are. The point where if you have to deal with one more crying kid, one more broken thing, one more anything you're going to lose it. The point where you would take your spouse on his most obnoxious and annoying day over not having him there at all, because at least then he could deal with All The Things.

It started when my alarm went off and it just went downhill from there.

By lunch I had cried because there was a load of clothes in the dryer that I forgot was there from the day before, and that meant I still had laundry to fold. Because someone switched the ice maker from crushed to cubed, and obviously cubed ice is of the devil. Because I could only fit in my stretchy pants. Because frigging Wal-Mart was out of my cheese. My cheese!

And then, in my stretchy pants, in the car on my way home from not buying my cheese, the song* came on.

That song. The song that Richard Marx recorded for the sole purpose of ripping the hearts out of everyone who has ever had to spend an extended amount of time away from their significant other.

Love him, hate him, think his head is abnormally large for his wee body--whatever you feel about the man, If you've ever been in that situation, this song will make you cry like a teething baby with a bad case of gas.

Oceans apart day after day
And I slowly go insane.
I hear your voice on the line
But it doesn't stop the pain.

If I see you next to never
How can we say forever?

(Nodding in agreement, tears and snot running down my face) Exactly!

I took for granted all the times
That I thought would last somehow.
I hear the laughter, I taste the tears
But I can't get near you now.

(Sob) I'm sorry I ever complained about you. (Snuffle) I'll never do it again. (Sob)

Wherever you go
Whatever you do
I will be right here waiting for you.
Whatever it takes
Or how my heart breaks
I will be right here waiting for you.

(Pulled over on the side of the road, sobbing unintelligibly)

And then I pulled myself together, went home, ate some chocolate (see: stretchy pants), took a nap, and braced myself for three more months.
Richard Marx be damned.

*Journey's "Faithfully" or Lonestar's "I'm Already There" have the same effect.
**Here, I dare you not to cry: