(Photo: Theresa Cisneros and her sons, Diego and Luis, after recording their Christmas DVD for her husband, a combat systems officer deployed aboard the USS Tarawa. Diego made a red paper airplane to show his dad. Alison St John/KPBS .)
Thousands of military families are finding ways to stay connected with their loved ones deployed overseas in Iraq or Afghanistan this Christmas. Some spouses will send their own personal Christmas message on DVD, courtesy of Sony Corporation. As Alison St John of KPBS in San Diego reports, hundreds of wives spent time alone with a video camera, and discovered it was a surprisingly intimate way to communicate with their husbands.
Theresa Cisneros emerged from a video booth with tears in her eyes. But she was in good spirits -- she and her two young sons, Diego and Luis, had just finished recording their Christmas DVD to her husband, who sailed out of San Diego harbor in November.
Cisneros : My husband is in the USS Tarawa
Luis : It’s a carrier, an aircraft a carrier
Cisneros : And they’re on the way to the gulf He’s the CSO.
Luis : The combat systems officer -- if something doesn’t work, it’s his fault.
Cisneros : No, he fixes that!
Cisneros says this is the second year her husband has missed Christmas with the family. She says she and the boys did their best, as they talked into the camera, to make him feel like he is still included in their Christmas celebrations, though sometimes her feelings got the better of her.
Cisneros : It’s sad to me.
Reporter : So it really felt like you were really with him?
Cisneros : Yes, we read him The Night Before Christmas , we sang him our favorite song, and we just talked.
They talked about the book Luis is reading on air craft carriers, like the one his dad is on, and about their plans for Christmas dinner.
Cisneros : Traditionally we make tamales for Christmas and so I said we’re going to make Tamales in your name and think of you because he loves them too.
The boys, aged 8 and 10 are already planning for their father’s return, though they’re not counting on anything.
Diego : He’s going to probably come back in June. He’s going to be there for my birthday.
Luis : Maybe, maybe!
Sitting, waiting to go into a booth to record her DVD, is Cindy Althouse. She’s with her two big, black shiny Labradors, each wearing a red and white Santa collar with bells on.
Althouse : And my husband is going to be so excited to see them, it’s going to be a nice surprise. We don’t have kids right now, so of course they’re our kids.
Althouse has dressed to look her best, she’s wearing a cheerful red sweater and she’s written what she wants to say on a piece of paper in case she forgets. But she knows this DVD is a chance to communicate something different from what she and her husband talk about in letters, on the phone and by email.
Althouse : I think to have the face with the voice is going to make a big difference, so I just want to make sure he knows I am very proud of him and I love him and I miss him and I’ll be here waiting for him when he comes home.
Baptista Fripp has come by herself. She got married in August and her husband sailed off to Iraq three months later. They are both 24. She’s learning what a Marine wife must do.
Fripp : Just be strong. I remember when he first left I was telling him how I was sad and stuff and it was making him really, really sad, so I was like I can’t do that because then it’s stressing him out and it’s like I have to be strong for him and let him know it’s going to be OK.
As Fripp heads off to the booth to record her video, Lesley Gray of the Armed Services YMCA says that kind of attitude can affect the course of the war.
Gray : It’s that family readiness that correlates directly to combat readiness.
Gray says the videos are a powerful way to link families for more than just the few minutes it takes to record them.
Gray : It’s also something the service member can play over and over again, you know, if two months down the road they can pop the DVD into any computer and say you know what, my family loves me I don’t need to worry about them, they’re doing fine.
No one knows exactly what the women choose to say to their husbands once they are alone in the camera booth. That time is for them alone.
Alison St John, KPBS News.
