All We Want for Christmas
by Krysta Murray My Christmas tree has never been up this early before but quite a lot of things are just different this year. With another surge of COVID-19 cases dimming our holiday lights and diminishing our holiday cheer, it isn’t the only time military families have had to get creative for holidays apart. The first Christmas my husband and I spent apart he was deployed to Iraq. He was one of the only married members of his assigned team and I remember buying Dollar Tree stockings for all four of them and gluing their names on the front with glitter. They got there just in time to be hung in their sleeping quarters along with anything I could think of to stuff them with to bring them all a little piece of home. New music they may have not heard, a set of cards to pass the time, favorite candy and snacks. I had the ability to go home to my family for the holidays that year and it was a fairly typical holiday season for me otherwise. Being from New England, we would go to the farm and cut our tree down, tie it to the truck and bring it home to set it up. We’d hang stockings on the mantle and hold Christmas cookie exchanges, holiday parties and cook all the traditional meals. Years later while we were stationed overseas, we had another holiday apart. My son and I took the long flight home
P26 | Coronado Magazine
