COVID-19 hosts holiday gatherings over Video Chat
Photo Courtesy of Allison Asbury
Freshman Alison Asbury and her grandmother FaceTime over the holiday break.
December 11, 2020
As the worldwide pandemic continues to progress, holidays will look different. Video chat programs including “Zoom” and “FaceTime” have become to new norm for family gatherings.
“My holidays are different from last year because of COVID, it ruined everything,” said sophomore Aydan McCarty. “You can only have a certain amount of people that you can be with. Grandparents may have pre-existing conditions and don’t want the chance of getting COVID.”
Due to COVID, families are choosing to not come together to celebrate the holidays.
“I like to see my family in-person, obviously, so it’s kind of disappointing when we can’t see them as much and be in contact with them as much as we could otherwise,” said freshman Alison Asbury.
Holiday traditions that have been attended to in previous years will be altered by many this year as many families will not be celebrating together for the holidays.
“I think it’s really sad not seeing your whole family because you don’t see your grandparents, or aunts and uncles at all during the year until the holidays,” said freshman Annabelle Kump. I think it’s really sad not seeing your whole family because you don’t see your grandparents, or aunts and uncles at all during the year until the holidays — Annabelle Kump
Various families in Piper have relatives that live out-of-state. Many are deciding to stay at home and not risk COVID affecting any of their family members.
“Last year, my grandma and cousins came up for Thanksgiving,” said sophomore Payton Zimmerman. “This year, none of them came, it was just my immediate family.”
According to McCarty with all the time spent at home, he has learned a lot and grown closer to his immediate family through the midst of all the change.
“I think at a certain point, you have to think about your quality of life, but when it’s small things like this and you can still FaceTime,” Asbury said. “I don’t think it’s a bad choice to make a cautious decision.”
