By Information Systems Technician 2nd Class Craig Kublicki, USS Essex (LHD 2)
Well, this isn’t exactly the “welcome home” I expected to come back to after months on the open ocean, but I can’t say I’m surprised. And as much as I’ve always feared this day, the writing is on the wall, so there’s no reason for me trying to swear-off what’s become obvious:
My wife has been learning English while I’ve been on deployment, and now she’s probably going to leave me once she comes to understand what an insufferable, fraudulent and oafish manchild I am.
It might sound like I’m overreacting, but I really have no doubt that once Sukhon is able to comprehend well beyond the basic words and phrases I taught her during the early days of our marriage (“Need beer,” “Bring me remote,” and “Back needs shaving,” among them), then there’s no way I’ll be able to keep hiding behind the false persona I’ve worked so hard to maintain ever since I found her on that “Thai Brides” website when I was stationed in Japan.
For example: Sukhon’s curious nature and evolving ability to communicate with other English speakers is surely going to lead to her discovering that I never deployed with the SEALs as their holodeck officer during the Bin Laden raid, that my being perpetually out of fitness regs has zero to do with some top secret Navy program researching the ability of sailors to survive on nothing but Nutella, bacon and Four Loko, and she’s for sure going to one day learn that those thousands of photos I’ve downloaded from the Internet are in no way connected to me doing “research” into developing a superior female shaving lotion, but rather that I just have a prevalent whipped cream and armpit fetish.
She’ll also most likely figure out that we took our wedding vows in Dothraki rather than English.
As bleak as things look, however, I suppose I should really count my blessings. Though I would prefer our marriage last much longer than it most likely will, at least the brief time I’ve had with my Thai wife has helped me overcome a lot of the self-inflicted ailments and poor habits I had before meeting her.
Thanks to the eight months I’ve spent sharing the same physical space with Sukhon (though it’s actually closer to six weeks, if you deduct my time on deployment) I’ve been forced to become less lazy, meaning I now bathe regularly and do actual laundry rather than just Fabreezing dirty uniforms, socks and skivvies without washing them for weeks at a time.
Being near my wife has also made me more comfortable around members of the opposite sex, so I no longer break into a profuse sweat in my palm and groin regions whenever I am in a close proximity to women (including mother).
And, maybe most importantly, I’ve now taken control of my all sexual voyeurism issues, and I no longer feel the urge to eavesdrop on people who are having sex through hotel walls as a means of erotic stimulation. (Instead, I now adhere to the much healthier practice of just pleasuring myself to amateur Ferengi cosplay porn shot on hidden bedroom cameras.)
Indeed, being with Sukhon has set off so many positive trends in my life I can’t help but think that — if only our relationship could last a while longer — Sukhon might eventually feel comfortable enough around me to stop sleeping fully clothed on top of the covers, and we could finally consummate our marriage.
But any hope of eventually losing my virginity to my wife is a mere pipe dream now, and it’s all thanks to her learning English.
Moving forward, I guess I’m just going to have to bite the bullet and accept that there’s only one way I’m ever going to meet a woman who is accepting of my failures, and who has the same interests, faults, fetishes and perversions that I do.
The thing is, I just never pictured myself being in a dual Navy marriage.
