Thanksgiving service, sacrifice can be as simple as small gatherings during the pandemic

Ryan Law and his wife should be excited to introduce their 8-month-old baby boy to as many friends and family members as possible on Thanksgiving.

But, with the coronavirus pandemic raging, it took three-and-a-half heart-wrenching months to make an in-person introduction of the boy they’re calling their new best friend or P.A.L., Parker Andrew Law, to Ryan’s mother.

Instead of a big family Thanksgiving this year, the couple will protect their firstborn’s vulnerable immune system by keeping their celebration tiny, like their son.

Law, 41, of New Paltz, was among the area residents who reflected in recent days about the sacrifices they’re making and thinking about, because of the pandemic, this holiday season.

“As we come into the holidays and we start to see a spike (of positive virus tests), unfortunately, we have to be careful, and that means making sacrifices not to have our new baby boy around the family,” Law said. “It’s tough, but we know that’s what we have to do to keep everyone healthy and safe.”

Law has made a career of sacrifices. He began in law enforcement as a corrections officer in 2005, became a SUNY New Paltz police force officer in 2009, and, for a time, also served part-time in other local police departments.

Now, he’s president of the Police Benevolent Association of New York state, a labor union representing university police, park police, state Department of Environmental Conservation officers and forest rangers.

Protecting & serving each other

Law still marvels that he’s around to be a police officer, after surviving his time as a NATO peacekeeper for the U.S. Army during the Bosnian War in 1999 and 2000. He has no memory of driving soldiers to safety in a Humvee after a grenade blast hurled him around 16 feet and knocked him unconscious.

Law has wanted to protect and serve people as a police officer since he was a child watching his maternal grandfather work as a security guard.

Law’s desire to help others is why he tries to see their underlying humanity, even in their ugliest moments. It’s why he’s passionate, while talking about the drivers who later thanked him for helping them turn around their lives after he pulled them over for drinking.

This holiday season, Law is hoping New Yorkers will protect and serve each other, by following public health and state officials’ guidance, from masking up to limiting at-home gatherings to no more than 10.

David Wenger, 42, of Chester, feels similarly. The owner of the Empire Diner in Monroe is making his own sacrifices, choosing not to take a Thanksgiving catering job to close the diner early at 3 p.m.

He wants to reward his employees for all they’ve endured this year, and give extra off time to those who have to make food because they won’t be at big Thanksgiving dinners with others cooking.

Attitude of gratitude

Wegner hopes customers will be thankful for their health, while sacrificing this holiday season by being extra safe during the pandemic, and knowing the diner’s staff “really appreciates the support we’ve gotten from the community.”

Taking a lunch break recently at the Town of Wallkill’s Galleria at Crystal Run mall, Maryanne Johnson said she’s thankful this November for the “health of my three kids and four grandchildren.”

She hopes Americans appreciate the sacrifices made overseas by U.S. soldiers, who “protect our American freedoms and don’t want to see them taken away,” as they’ve come to symbolize American strength and resilience since 1776.

Nearby, sitting in a mall massage chair, Vito Rometo, 84, of the Town of Wallkill, said he might have to sacrifice a long-planned trip with family to visit Mexico at the end of November.

But he thinks canceling travel plans hardly compares to the sacrifices others, from health care personnel to other essential employees, are making during the pandemic or what he did to take care of his family during a long career making and delivering wooden pallets.

He’s just thankful for a healthy family, including a son who wants him to come over for Thanksgiving, “though I’m not too sure I want to go” due to the pandemic.

Besides appreciating the sacrifices so many have to make this year, “We all have to try to be careful,” Rometo added.

daxelrod@th-record.com