How did this happen?!

I still feel like a foreigner in the States.  I'm not sure what it is.  I can't quite put my finger on it.  I just feel odd here.  And the past 6 months still feels like a whirl of confusion and foggy dream like living.  It's flown by, but it's been so utterly and painfully slow, too.  Some days I just don't understand how we got here.  How did we get to Minot?!  The Lord paved the way, but why? 
Why?

   
On the way home from church yesterday Josh and I were talking about the church we'd visited that morning and what we liked (loved) about it.  I had three girls (ladies sounds too......impersonal - or something.  I don't know) my age come up to me immediately after the service to find out my name and how long we'd been in town.  I honestly was floored, and wanted to cry in front of them, right then and there.  After a long 10 days of feeling like this base we've moved to is a ghost town, it felt like a spring in the desert.  I mentioned this to Josh and a sting hit my heart - longing for our community in Turkey, and on the Island and in Florida.  We contemplated our time at each place and have decided, after a week and a half at a State side base (that is known for it's friendliness and community) overseas military life is just an entirely different military life.  I remember talking to Jess about this a bit this past week when we were drinking Çay at her place.  She commiserated.  We are both saddened by how unfriendly is feels here.  She and her family moved from Turkey in mid November.  We had just enough time to get to know them well enough to be sad that our time there didn't cross over more with theirs.  We had no way of anticipating that we'd be at the same base in the United States just 9 months later.  
I desperately miss the closeness and "Mayberry" feel of Incirlik, and Lajes.  We lived off base in Florida but had immediate community there because we were there for medical residency and already knew a couple there that got us plugged in with all their friends. We didn't live on base at Lajes, but being on a teeny island forced folks to band together and form community.  There was simply nowhere else to go.  At Incirlik there was literally nowhere else to go and nothing else to do, unless a hospital visit was in order.  But even that only provided a short respite from the confinement of the fences.  Because of the lockdown that happened when we'd been there a mere 24 hours and never lifted, community was the only thing to do.  We ate together at last minutes notice, hollered across the street at a loved one when they came out of their house to get into their car, watched our kids play together and felt safe letting them wander to a friends house (within reason), walked to the commissary together or the thrift shop or went on "adventures" around the perimeter of the base to see outside the barbed fences.  I desperately miss the impromptu visits, and the constant doing life together with people that were so real and genuine and raw.  How thankful I am that Jess is here and that the Lord has provided that friendship.  
We've been on many walks around housing, and to many parks and around base, but there's rarely anyone out, and when there is there's little acknowledgment.    
How I miss the 1950's neighborhood feel.  
Florida, the Island and Turkey gave us a taste of community that we want to foster everywhere we go, but we aren't sure how to do it in this country where we were born and raised, where people are so independent and keep to themselves so entirely.  Our culture doesn't make it easy to do life together.  Our culture doesn't emphasize the importance of community (outside cyber relationships).  How can we start to change that right where we are, right now?  

I miss our overseas life.  I miss our tight knit communities.  I miss doing life together with those around us.  
Our prayer here is that the Lord show us what our role is on this base, aside from Josh's job.  Thinking of not hosting a group in our home weekly as we've done for the past 6 years makes my heart hurt, but we have no idea how to go about finding people that desire that like we do.  Aside from sweet Jess and her family, no one has reached out.  No one has tried to connect.  This just feels so utterly odd, and sad.