It is very difficult to enjoy the holidays when the family members you miss the most are not there to celebrate with you. It is very rare for my brothers to come home for Thanksgiving, but knowing this year we will not see them at all during these few upcoming holidays is very upsetting. Along with my two brothers, my father will also not be celebrating the few upcoming holidays with me and the rest of our family.

Usually during Halloween my father and I watch scary movies and movies that relate to Halloween. We also carve pumpkins together and we put them out on our deck. But since he was not here this year we could not do any of those events together. Watching scary movies, Halloween movies, and carving pumpkins without him was very weird.

During Thanksgiving we make our whole feast for just the two of us. We usually have turkey, ham, yams, mashed potatoes, pumpkin pie, corn, buttered noodles, stuffing, beets, rolls, etc. He will eat the ham and I will eat the turkey. It is always nice spending Thanksgiving with my father because I am very grateful for him and for all that he does for me. We spend the days we have together but it is not everyday we get to make ourselves an entire feast. This year I will not be able to spend Thanksgiving with my father due to him being deployed in Afghanistan. He will have a Thanksgiving dinner over there, but we both know it is not the same when you are not with your family eating a meal you made together.

The next two holidays my family will be spending without my brothers and my father are Christmas and New Years. Christmas will be a very lonely holiday this year due to the absence of Matthew, JR, and my dad. At the DePhillips/Camps household it will be me, my mother and stepdad, my sister, my nieces, and my step siblings. It will not be the same without those three men. New Years will be extremely lonely and quiet in my house. Matthew, JR, their friends, my mother, and myself all shoot guns when the ball drops at midnight. They will not be here to do that with us this year. It will be the first Christmas where my brother will not be home.

I cannot wait to see my brothers and my father again. I have missed all three of them so much. The few upcoming holidays will be quiet and lonely without them, but because of their jobs they cannot come home this year.