Life at "home", vacations and typical Military Brat family life for many is very similar, but every base and post was different and so for many Military Brats, family life was very different, especially for families living overseas or in U.S. in remote areas or under difficult circumstances.

The essays in this category are offered to give a glimpse of what life is like when you live every day for the Army, Air Force, Navy, Marines, Coast Guard and National Guard.

For those of us who lived the life, it was normal—it was what we knew and what we accepted. For the civilian observer, it was not normal at all.

With fences capped with barbed wire, check points, guards, special rules and protocols, training, alerts, tearful deployments and joyeous reunions, life in a military family was different.