Matthew

Last night my brother told us all he's joining the military this spring.. He'll be doing his training in March and if he makes it in, he'll be away for six years. He won't be able to come home until two years after training and that will only be for a very short period before he goes right back to fight. Matthew was really upset last night because he's really short on money and couldn't get us gifts this year, this morning he just pulled out his wallet and gave us 20's but I didn't want to accept it. I did. He was upset because we won't have a christmas together again for another three years. It scares me. He always jumps into whatever comes to mind. Last night in the living room he was showing me these training videos of what it will be like. He'd skip through the parts that would be the trained marines talking, and I would only hear clips of what they'd say as he skipped through,
"It's putting your whole life at risk."
"You're fighting for your country and your life."

And then he'd get to the scenes with the action, and turn up the volume. Them jumping from planes and shooting right once on ground, them swimming through swamps with alligators and deadly snakes, crawling on the ground through the forests, and I was trying to picture him doing all of this.. But I couldn't. When we were talking in the kitchen, and when he was showing me all of these things I was trying to pretend I was more interested than I really was. "Oh yeah, that's awesome." Responding to the video the same way you'd respond to watching somebody play a video game. But the truth is I don't want him to go, and I'm scared. But when I asked him, "Does it scare you?" He said, "What?" and I said, "Any of that?" He goes, "No, I love that shit. It's what I've always wanted. I'll be able to face any situation after this."

And I was silent.