"We Won’t Gather This Year So We Can Gather Next Year"

To be “all in this thing together,” we must stay apart. So how are you planning to navigate the holiday season this year? We asked. You answered. ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌  [View in Browser]( | [Donate [WBUR]]( [WBUR](  [WBUR]( November 22, 2020 Dear Cog reader, Clearly, the 2020 holiday season will be unlike any other in modern history. The CDC is strongly recommending that people not travel for Thanksgiving. Public health experts say that the safest, most prudent approach to the holidays this year is to stay home. To be “all in this thing together” means we must stay apart. But this much separation from one another is hard. After nearly nine months, pandemic fatigue is real. We wanted to know how people are coping, so we asked our readers and contributors to tell us how they’re planning to navigate the holiday season this year. The [responses we received]( were heartfelt and affirming. Across the board, we found that you are taking the dangers of the pandemic seriously. That you are planning to make big sacrifices, at great personal cost, to keep yourselves and your communities safe. If you can’t hold your loved ones close this year, we hope you’ll find some hope and connection in our collection of responses. Take heart in the vivid descriptions of food (so many of you are relieved not to be eating turkey!), the gratitude for simple things and the inventive ways we are all finding our way through. The poet Mary Oliver said, “Keep some room in your heart for the unimaginable.” That seems just right for this holiday season. Happy Thanksgiving, dear readers. This year, as ever, we are grateful for you. P.S.– We're taking next Sunday off. See you back here in two weeks. — Cloe Axelson and Frannie Carr Toth Cognoscenti editors newsletters@wbur.org Must Reads url[A Holiday Season Gutted By The Pandemic: We're Trying To 'Celebrate And Grieve At The Same Time']( The experts agree: to be “all in this thing together,” we must stay apart. So how are you planning to navigate the holiday season this year? We asked. You answered. [Read more](.   #%23%23[Twitter](  #%23%23[Facebook](    [The Pandemic Is Giving Me The Thanksgiving Of My Dreams: No Turkey, No Small Talk]( After 18 holidays with my husband's family, writes Traer Scott, the idea of this one on my own terms has made me euphoric. [Read more](. [Trump Lost. So Why Is The Media Still So Fixated On His Supporters?]( At a moment of profound consequence for rebuilding norms around civic discourse, writes Leigh Gilmore, why are we asked to listen to the people who are least interested in that project? [Read more](.  Support the news [Escaping Headlines Of Death, Amid Memorials To The Dead]( A recent walk in a Belmont wildlife sanctuary got Rich Barlow thinking about life's potential and its fragility. [Read more](. [Let’s Use The Vaccine To Make Our Health System More Equitable]( The medical community must lead in the effort to verify the science behind the vaccines, and then to increase the public’s faith and confidence in actually taking them, writes Dr. David Rosman. [Read more](. [The COVID-19 Outbreak In Mass. Prisons Exposes A Larger Human Rights Crisis]( The rapid spread of COVID-19 within the Massachusetts Department of Corrections has been careless and preventable, writes Sarah Laughlin. [Read more](. What We're Reading "... instead of suggesting nine handy tips to make your big family get-together safer, I’m suggesting only one thing: Maybe just don’t. The turkey will still taste good in a few months, when everyone is vaccinated — and next year’s turkey will taste a lot better if everyone’s still around to eat it." ("[My No. 1 Thanksgiving Tip: Don’t Gather This Year]( The Washington Post) "Biden was partly elected on his call to heal the deep political divisions in the country. The wide gulf in worldviews between Republicans and Democrats might actually be so vast, no president could bridge it. (It certainly was too wide for Barack Obama, who pledged to do the same, to bridge.) But one thing that is absolutely in Biden’s control is to have something of a bipartisan cabinet. To do that, he will need to seek out and offer top jobs to Republicans." ("[Why Charlie Baker Is More Likely To Be Offered A Biden Cabinet Post Than Elizabeth Warren]( The Boston Globe) "Museums have for decades luxuriated in a public image as the last great bastions of liberal cosmopolitanism. But increasingly, they are facing critiques from inside their own walls. Museum workers, artists, and critics are saying that museums need to change. Not just when it comes to what’s on their walls, but also how they collect, whom they hire, and how they cater to their audiences." ("[If Museums Want To Diversify, They’ll Have To Change. A Lot]( Vox) “ We held a family vote and agreed that we don't even like turkey, so we're going to fry chicken instead. — KJ Dell'Antonia, "[A Holiday Season Gutted By The Pandemic: We're Trying To 'Celebrate And Grieve At The Same Time']( ICYMI [How The 1918 Pandemic Haunted My Family For Generations]( For my family, the damage of the virus reached beyond my grandfather's death, writes S. Schirl Smith. The wounds of the young boy he left behind festered in the man who would become my father.      If you’d like to write for Cognoscenti, send your submission, pasted into your email and not as an attachment, to opinion@wbur.org. Please tell us in one line what the piece is about, and please tell us in one line who you are. 😎 Forward to a friend. They can sign up [here](. 📣 Give us your feedback: newsletters@wbur.org 📨 Get more WBUR stories sent to your inbox. 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