As I was leaving my little college town of Athens to go see my family for the winter break, I heard an overwhelming amount of students dreading going back home. As they all had their reasons for why they wanted to stay in Athens, one of the reasons that stood out the most was their crazy families. Not everyone is a home-body but it amazed me how many people chose to go to college where we do because they wanted to get away from their home lives. And while I also chose to go away, it made me realize how truly thankful I was to have the home life that I do. We aren’t “normal” by any means but, honestly, who really is?

After I left the city to go off to college, it made me realize how truly thankful I am for holiday breaks and random long weekends that I can spend with my family. Everyone needs to experience life for themselves, and college is a lot of time the first step in that direction. But that doesn’t mean I don’t cherish the nights that I stay up watching crime shows with my mom, going to hockey games with my dad or even Christmas shopping with my little brothers who would rather pick things out for themselves. And while we all have times that we bicker at each other, after being in the house for more than 20 minutes, I wouldn’t trade any of this time for the world.

As we get older and grow out of the stage of ignoring our parents and siblings it’s amazing the little moments that we enjoy now as compared to a few years when we would just roll our eyes and leave the room. Not having the luxury of seeing our families everyday makes us cherish and appreciate the time we do have with them so much more than we used to. We never stayed home on Friday nights to play board games and laugh about embarrassing old stories until we were all in tears. We never realized how much we would miss home cooked meals. And we never thanked our parents for everything they did for us, even the stick days of not letting do “anything,” we can start looking back and realizing why they tried to protect us from stupid decisions even if we made them anyway.

So this holiday season, let us not take the time we have with our families for granted. Enjoy the nights of laying around watching cheesy Christmas movies and building gingerbread houses. Love the mornings that we can spend brunch with our moms drinking coffee and talking for three hours. Embrace the suggestions that they have for our life even if we don’t agree with them. And don’t be in such a hurry to leave, because just as much as we can’t wait to see our friends again, they hate saying goodbye every time.