Originally Posted by
flynavyj
Hey all - Loved reading through thread!
The obvious question will be moving my family to one of the bases likely on the southern border, away from our immediate family and near no friends or support structure.
Sorry to hear about your recent job loss. Based on the years of posting here, I know this industry has not been nice to ya. As someone who endured the TX-MX border for 8 years with no ties to the area (military), I cannot recommend it, absent natural filial ties. I would really have a frank conversation with your loved ones about what it will mean to relocate to proverbial McAllen/Laredo. I know folks in Sierra Vista as well (on the ground pounder side of CBP, though I like to call AMO Border Patrol too since it gets under their skin), and the AZ border locales are not much better. I get a paycheck is a paycheck, but there's more to life than money. I had to get my family out. I was about to geobachelor them, but lucked out with snagging a PCS right as the kid was about to start gradeschool.
Some people geobachelor to San Antonio/Corpus on the weekends from these locations, but most can't do it long-term and the families start disfunctioning, which drives divorces or calls to quit the job. Those with actual experience with AMO can tell you about the expectation management wrt transfers in that agency. I remember everybody who worked at any 3 letter agency in the location I was military was at, was indeed looking for the transfer. The location was known as a junior point of entry where everybody and their mother went to in order gain access to federal employment; from there everybody would inter-agency bail to the first alphabet soup that got them away from the hinterlands. People don't even make a secret about it, so you're not alone in this issue.
Good luck to ya in whatever you decide. If I was forced to seek civil employment away from military flying before I could retire, I'd probably just lean on an ASI gig to a more tolerable location, and fly my private airplane on the side. But that's me at my current stage in life and with a family in tow. The wife made it pretty clear: Other than Aguadilla (I'm native to PR), she's a no-go on MX-border or desert town living anymore. Happy wife happy life. To each their own.