How to soothe a sad momma

Ok, so this disrupts Mari's chronological order of the blog but this had to be said and it needed to be today, for me and for the rest of the world to know I'll come out alive on the other side. Today was a sad day for us. We had to drop daddy back off at the airport on a very early, very rainy Halloween morning. There would have been no good time to do this task, so for us, one day was as good as the next. Jackson is always so good with this Army life transition of Daddy home, Daddy not. It's all he's ever known so when the time comes to say goodbye again, he does it with a smile and assurance that he'll be back as soon as he can. Me on the other hand, It never gets easier. In fact, under the circumstances of raising the boys alone, it only gets harder for me. I do gather my crippled emotions faster when it comes to loosing it in front of them but it still happens.
So as we drive away from the airport drop-off, I fumble to find Christmas music that will stifle my sniffles and disguise my tears. Jackson ask, "Mom are you sad?" I tell him that yes, I'm sad because I'll miss Daddy. He says, "but he'll be back. Don't be sad". I attempt to glean some of the strength he displays and he says "Mom, you can have one of my toy book pages if it will make you feel better" He proceeds to rip one of the pages from his prized Toys-R-us catalog and hand it to me. I finally composed myself and hit the interstate home sipping my luke warm coffee like it was my best friend. He then said, "Mom, do you feel better now?" and I said yes, I'm better now so he said "Could I have my page back then?"
I guess the song and verse is true in more ways than one: He gives and takes away.