Thanksgiving Dinner with Jamie Oliver & Eric Stonestreet

I was thrilled to see the reunion of an American soldier with his family, but you fell into the proverbial romantic trap: a soldier who is overseas and yet still able to communicate with his family - in this case via Skype - and is actually able to come home. When my son, who is a private in the Canadian infantry, first told me that he was being deployed to Afghanistan, I pictured him at the base in Khandahar, having a Timmies every morning and then going off to work. This is the picture that most of us have - a brave, but relatively civilized excursion, alleviated somewhat by regular connections to home via internet or phone.
In fact, my son was outside the base, all the time, on patrol and/or guarding checkpoints. He/we had no access to phone calls, let alone Skype. He was able to call out twice in 8 months. He is back now, and fine - but I now know that if you are to honour your soldiers and their families, you should think carefully about who you choose, and should specifically acknowledge those who are or were actually in the "trenches" and not able to skype or call or get leave to come home.