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Hazel Mayfield usually cooks the Thanksgiving meal for her extended family in Houston, Texas. It usually welcomes friends and neighbors eager to sample its Cajun fried turkey, green bean casserole, candied sweet potato, homemade cornbread dressing, and dirty rice – just a few of its signature dishes. Known as Suga Mama, because her grandchildren think she is so sweet, the 91-year-old generally likes to shop for ingredients to make her specialty dishes.
“My mother is the head cook of the family,” said Paulette Mouton, Mayfield’s daughter. “Because of his reputation, you know, there are people in and out all day, everyone’s family comes out. They want to have some Sugar Mama cooking. We’re from Louisiana and we’re cooking all of this. “(One in six Americans could go hungry in 2020 as the pandemic persists.)
But Mayfield hasn’t gone grocery shopping since March. And there is little about Thanksgiving 2020 that is normal. Hundreds of thousands of American families have reinvented the vacation with virtual celebrations, canceled or delayed travel plans, or opted for small gatherings with people in their families in response to COVID-19, the deadly virus that has killed more than 250,000 people in the United States and life shattered around the world.
This year, Mayfield’s family members lament the absence of a large gathering. They explained to their young children and grandchildren why Thanksgiving this year is different. Mayfield’s youngest daughter Michelle Sanders says it’s hard to help her grandchildren understand why they can’t see some of their other family members.
“It’s really hard, trying to explain them,” Sanders said. “When you talk to them and they say, Nana, I want to come, you have to tell them no. They don’t really know how to be careful. “
Sanders added, “And they don’t get it, being three, four and six, you know they don’t really get it. So it is… It’s really, really difficult and heartbreaking.”
In what would normally be the busiest vacation travel week of the year, Americans across the country have changed Thanksgiving plans in favor of safer, less risky alternatives. However, more than three million people are said to have traveled to US airports this week. AAA expects a 10% drop in vacation travel this week, the biggest drop since the 2008 recession. Given the CDC travel warnings, some have called for even greater limits on travel. For larger families whose Thanksgiving traditions stretch back many generations, this year is especially difficult. (Here are 10 ways families can minimize the risk of vacation travel.)
Angie McWhoter, Mayfield’s granddaughter living in Los Angeles, California, had to cancel her trip to Houston. In the past 28 years, his family has traveled to Houston 26 times for Thanksgiving, and this year just doesn’t feel right.
“We’re not a family that visits once a year, McWhoter said, and Thanksgiving is a fact.” All the kids, all the cousins, everyone knows where they should be. So it’s just crazy. “
Family is what McWhorter says she will miss this vacation the most, but she doesn’t want to take the risk of making Suga Mama and other family members sick.
“I don’t even know how to do Thanksgiving without them because I really didn’t have to – I don’t do Thanksgiving without them,” she said. “You know, I don’t want to take the risk of any of us bringing something to my COVID grandmother, and I don’t want to take it home to my mom.”
Like many other holidays and events in 2020, adjustments to traditional norms are needed. Too many families will have empty places where their beloved family members who live were previously taken by COVID. For some families trying to maintain a sense of normality, hard memories of the pandemic are everywhere.
In Houston, the Thanksgiving Day parade is canceled for the first time in 71 years. The parade is also canceled in Chicago, but the city guarantees a place in the 2021 parade for those who will not be able to participate this year. Macy’s Thanksgiving Day Parade will be virtual, the first time there hasn’t been a physical parade in 75 years.
In addition to the cancellation of the parades, many cities and states have placed orders or stay restrictions for Thanksgiving. Chicago Mayor Lori Lightfoot issued a city stay order and urged people to cancel all traditional Thanksgiving plans. Governor Tom Wolfe of Pennsylvania has issued a statewide home stay restriction, which has forced most businesses to travel remotely.
Whether it’s socially distancing with family members or hosting a virtual Zoom meetup, this year’s vacation is unorthodox. COVID-19 not only changed vacation travel plans for Americans nationwide, but it had an effect on Americans outside the country trying to return home to be with family.
Lindsay Walsh, originally from San Francisco, California, moved to Mexico City in 2014 for a job at a startup. Since 2014, she has always returned home to the United States to spend the holidays with her family. But this year she will be spending the holidays in Mexico with her husband.
“This will be the first Thanksgiving I haven’t spent with my family,” Walsh said. “He’s basically going to cook all day, you know, let’s hope we open a nice bottle of wine, and then we plan to eat on Zoom with my family.” (Don’t let the pandemic rob us of joyful traditions – even gloomy and uncertain times can contain sparks of love and light.)
Walsh said his mother and two sisters are currently in the San Francisco Bay Area and his father lives in Barbados with his partner. “So, we’re going to do some sort of triangulation between three different countries, three different time zones, trying to see if we can get on Zoom at the same time and enjoy a meal.”
Thanksgiving is something Walsh has always been waiting for, since she hasn’t lived in her hometown since she went to college. Now he has to wait until next year to see his family in person.
“This is the longest period I’ve ever spent in my life without seeing my family,” she said.
“So, it’s just that beyond all the rituals, which in themselves are very often comforting, it’s really the loss of being able to see my family and the kind of weight I think I’ve struggled with.”
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