A Sponsor? What's that???

Our day started with a rush.  Upon waking up the next morning, I went to the window and immediately wanted to crawl into a hole and wait for Spring.  It looked even colder than it had the day before.  What must have been slush the day before was now hard ice drifts.  Cautiously braving the slippery parking lot, we had made our way to a local diner for a belly bomber breakfast.

That day was going to be another whirl of activity.  To be honest, that young woman was ready for some peace and quiet in her life.  So many changes had tumbled down on her the preceding months that she was just ready to find a home and hole up for a while, especially after finding herself in such a cold, white place.  My engineer explained that our sponsor was supposed to be meeting us to take us to base to take care of housing.

Sponsor?  What on earth was a sponsor?   I laugh at the idea of a sponsor now.  We didn't have a decent sponsor until we moved to Europe years later.  This poor guy who got "assigned" to us was single, over tasked, and just didn't want to do it.  After meeting up with him, he informed us that the squadron was looking for someone else to take care of us. Talk about making a girl feel welcome!  I had the distinct feeling that I was a burden that no one wanted.  At that point, it made me feel even less comfortable about asking questions about our new home.

All too often, what happened to us, happens to most families.  The sponsorship program is good in theory, but, unless squadrons carefully choose their sponsors and give them the time to get the job done, new families are often left to their own devices.  While some may appear to thrive in this situation, many start their new assignments with a bitter taste that soon develops into repulsion, laying the foundation for a very, very long tour, and very short career.  The military expects its service members to arrive and be ready to work immediately.  While given a grace period to take care of housing, there is the constant pressure to report to duty as soon as possible.

While many bases are making strides to provide information sessions for families coming in, the quality of these sessions is completely dependent on both the base commander and squadron commander's personal vision of family in the military.  At some locations, they have created some of the most awesome, welcoming spouses' newcomer sessions, while others don't even want to fully welcome spouses into the newcomer's briefing.  While spouses may be "encouraged" to attend, it is evident that any questions are not welcome, nor is most of the information what spouses need to run their households.

That is what I, as a young spouse arriving at our first duty station, dealt with.  I remember going to the meeting, sitting quietly, listening to briefings from so many different organizations that I could never keep them straight.  The only thing I remember from that first newcomer's briefing is the fear that I had to ask any questions. So many uniforms! So much "officialness."  So few spouses!  It should have been a place where I could have voiced concerns and received real world answers that would have allowed me to step out with a little assurance that everything was going to be ok.  Instead, I had just arrived in the Great White North.  Our sponsor gave the distinct message that he was too busy to help us.  The newcomer's briefing was for service members, not for spouses.  And it was a frozen wasteland outside! None of these pieces fit together to form a good picture.

Over the next few days we got our new sponsor.  He and his wife (also active duty) were a wonderful couple who welcomed us and helped us go through the motions of in-processing.  They knew so much and gave the impression that they had all the time in the world to help us.  While we were careful not to impose, it was wonderful to have someone help us along that path that we knew nothing about.  Before we knew it, we had our appointment at the housing office to get our on base house.  The fact that the military actually provided housing was baffling to me.  There had to be an angle.