I suppose those of us living this strange, transient military life learn much the same thing. We become practiced at being new. We learn how to introduce ourselves again, how to explain where we came from and how long we expect to stay, and how to smile through that uncomfortable stretch when everyone else seems to have people and we are still trying to figure out where ours might be.

One of the quiet gifts of this life is how often neighbors become more than acquaintances. They become the people your children run to after school, the ones who walk into your kitchen without knocking, the ones who slip into your days until you cannot imagine living without them. In a world where change is constant, neighbors have so often been the steadying presence that made each new duty station feel like home.