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Coronavirus News: Long Island families find unique, safe ways to spend Thanksgiving

COVID-19 News and Information

Wednesday, November 25, 2020

Families find unique, safe ways to spend Thanksgiving

Stacey Sager interviews families on Long Island who are finding unique ways to spend Thanksgiving safely.

UNIONDALE, Long Island (WABC) -- Families on Long Island are finding unique, safe ways to spend their Thanksgiving amid the pandemic.

If the road to normalcy seems rocky in this pandemic, try parking your car for a while -- at least for Thanksgiving.

That's what Debbie Gershow, of Plainview, has in mind.

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"I'll bring everybody's food, everybody will have their own plate, wrapped in tin foil," Gershow said.

Everybody will be in their own cars, four of them.

Her ex-husband, her 25-year-old daughter and her 21-year- old son Jesse - a senior, at Hofstra University.

"I'm definitely excited to see how it goes, you know, it's not normal," Lindell said.

But whose family is? And nothing about 2020 seems normal.

"I've got games, we'll play bingo in the car separately, we do Mad Libs, I-Spy ... I have a whole list of games," Gershow said.

Unlike what we all envision as our traditional Thanksgiving, if you have kids who live on their own, or you have a blended family, COVID safety this year is a huge concern.

If the vast, open space of a parking lot really isn't your thing, we caught up with other people planning to make the best of the unusual Thanksgiving in other ways.

Mike Marza reports there is a 71% drop in air travel this Thanksgiving season.

"We saw that there were giant food lines, and we felt really bad, so one thing that my mom and I wanted to do was help out in any way that we can, so we were in touch with our local church," Westbury resident Courtney Henley said.

Donating food is also a great choice. If you are at home, games with the little ones still make a difference.

"My daughter started to play chess, and video games obviously, that's number one on the list," Carle Place resident Alfredo Saca said.

But for Gershow, it meant searching for an answer in an unlikely place.

"And then every now and then, you just get hit with this wave of emotion, like, we're having Thanksgiving in a parking lot," Gershow said.