A happy Thanksgiving — or was it?

Just two days ago we celebrated my favorite holiday of the year, Thanksgiving. But it was not the same this year — not for our family and not for most families in this country. The global coronavirus pandemic changed all that. COVID-19 has had a horrific and devastating impact on people’s lives and the economy.

Unbelievably, some folks still think it is a hoax. Or, at the most, an exaggerated variation of the flu that, if you’re strong-willed enough, you can easily get over.

Well, my eldest daughter’s mother-in-law caught the virus, and she died. It was no hoax for her or her family. And it has not been a hoax for the families of the quarter-million other Americans who have died so far this year, or the nearly 2,000 who are now dying every day from COVID-19.

And then there are the millions who have lost their jobs and the many thousands who have joined the homeless because they can’t pay their mortgage or the rent on their apartments.

As we sat around the dinner table and enjoyed our Thanksgiving feast, we thought about all those other families, our fellow Americans, who are not as fortunate. Food banks across the country report that their lines are twice as long as they used to be and that many more of those in line are families with small children. How is it that in the richest country in the world, so many are still going hungry? But they are.

Of course, every crisis does produce some unexpected positive outcomes, and we can point to a few of these from COVID-19. Carbon emissions are down. Because manufacturing and air travel have declined significantly, our planet has had time to rejuvenate.

Before the pandemic, we were so busy that we didn’t take time to enjoy those special moments with our loved ones. COVID-19 has forced us to slow down and find other ways to stay connected with people, even if we’re doing it virtually. In the workplace, many companies now work remotely. They are trusting their employees to work productively even when no one is looking over their shoulders.

And we’ve learned how to socially interact more hygienically. We remember to cover our mouths when we cough or sneeze and wash our hands more frequently because we know what can happen if we don’t. It’s no longer just a good habit, but what we must do for survival.

Debbie Haski-Leventhal, professor of management at the Macquarie Business School in Australia, says COVID-19 has offered a new perspective on everything we have taken for granted for so long. We never questioned how life as we know it could be suddenly taken away from us. Perhaps, she hopes, when this crisis is finally over, we will have acquired a new sense of appreciation and gratitude for what we have.

Except we can’t wait for the crisis to be over. For those millions who are now in desperate need, the time has run out. They need help right now. And yet, like Emperor Nero in Rome, our political leaders in Washington are fiddling away while America is burning from the fever of COVID-19. It is shameful. It is cruel, and it is wrong.

Contact your U.S. senators and tell them, and plead with them, to do something about this — and do it right now.

And that’s how I see it.