Most people are concerned about how the future holidays of 2020 and 2021 are going to work and if they’ll even be able to spend time with their extended families. Thanksgiving is right around the corner and there are still people unsure of what their plans are since COVID-19 is a major factor this year for the prevention of being around a large group of family members. There are still many rules and steps to follow for the protection of others and individually from the global virus.

It is very significant for people to follow the rules of protecting themselves and others around them during holidays. This is because those people who came to visit them could possibly take the virus with them back to wherever they live which could be a different state. We’re trying to prevent the spread of COVID-19, not infect friends and family on purpose. For the upcoming holidays, there could be some ways to slightly overcome these obstacles. Family members could wear masks when meeting together for Thanksgiving or we could simply just invite a specific amount of close people to spend the event with. 

To hear some opinions or ideas about Thanksgiving for this year, two people were asked separate questions regarding the topic. The first question asked, “How do you think COVID-19 is going to affect Thanksgiving and holidays this year and in the future? Do you think there would be difficulties or obstacles? Why or Why not?” Pitman High School sophomore, Alisha Dhillion, replied with, “ I feel like it’s kind of hard to do Thanksgiving this year because most people aren’t going to follow procedures. They’re going to be ignorant about everything. The numbers are going to spike and I think it’s kind of stupid to get together. I feel like it’s going to impact the future because people are going to look back and say it was a time of sadness and hard time and it’s kind of hard to have Thanksgiving this year because everyone’s in low spirits. Some obstacles would be restrictions and spike in numbers and etc. I just feel like overall it’s not a good idea but it’s hard to enforce that on people. ” 

Another Pitman High School sophomore, Simret Khinda, was asked a different question, “What were your plans for this Thanksgiving and how did they change if they did?” She answered this question with, “My family and I were originally planning on going to another family member’s house this Thanksgiving to see our other side of the family. There would have been a lot of people in the house because we have such a large family and we wanted to spend time with one another this holiday. But since we’re going through the global pandemic we are not able to do that plan anymore. My family and I just decided to stay home this holiday and maybe call our other family members. It would be safer for them and ourselves.” 

These two responses were significant because we can see how people are thinking or their perspective on the situation. However, it does need to be made clear that there aren’t any exceptions to the COVID-19 rules this year. Everyone must follow them and deal with it because again, we don’t want to purposely spread the virus to family members. We want to keep them safe. It will be unfortunate that we aren’t able to spend time with a lot of family during the holidays, but at least we’re protecting them and ourselves.