It’s Thanksgiving week and I’m supposed to be counting my blessings.

I’m struggling with it right now. We are right in the middle of quarantining our family. Despite out best efforts, despite taking every precaution we could, one of us ended up having direct contact with a COVID positive. Of course, with our luck, it just happens to have been A.

A. The one with the severe congenital heart defect. The one with the underlying condition that greatly increases the odds that he will die from the disease.

I am so angry. Angry first at myself. We knew the risks, and yet we tried to balance the need to have “normal” activities. We tried to balance the risk of COVID with keeping him mentally and physically healthy in other respects. And we failed. I am angry at this community where every time I am in the grocery store, I see people without masks.

Where, in the online communities, people continue to proclaim this is a hoax, and that masks are an infringement on their rights. This community where people who have been known to have exposure are still out with friends, still participating in group activities, and throwing caution to the wind.

I keep seeing people carelessly throw out comments like “it only affects people with pre-existing conditions.”

Maybe people don’t understand what constitutes a pre-existing condition? Did you know that pregnancy constitutes a pre-existing condition? Despite the fact that most moms to be try to be healthier than ever for their future child, just being pregnant is enough to make a person high risk. Being overweight is also a risk factor. According to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, as many as one-third of Americans are obese. Another one-third are overweight. So, two out of every three people in America can be considered in this category as higher risk. I may consider myself a healthy person who gets a lot of physical activity, and who eats a well-balanced diet, and who takes my vitamins. But, at the end of the day, overweight is overweight.

Having asthma, or any type of lung disease, also puts you in a high-risk category. As someone who has coached youth sports for decades, I can tell you, there are a lot of kids walking around out there that have been diagnosed with asthma. According to the CDC, 1 in 13 people have it. In a classroom with 26 kids, that means, statistically speaking, at least two of them could theoretically be high risk.

The odds of someone having a congenital heart defect is about 1 in 100. So, in a school with 500 students, odds are there are five of them who are at a higher risk.

Living in a community where coal was king for a long time, we also have a significant population of older people who may have black lung or related diseases. These people are all part of the at-risk population. Cancer patients, and cancer survivors, are also at a higher risk. Not only are their immune systems weaker, but getting the virus will most likely put a halt to the cancer treatments they’re receiving.

Try to put yourself in the shoes of a person who is desperate to eradicate cancer from their body but can’t because they have to fight off a virus instead. Transplant patients, diabetics, anyone at all who has any kind of long-term illness like cystic fibrosis or multiple sclerosis. These people are all at risk.

The numbers in our area are climbing. Math and science don’t care what you believe, they just go along minding their own business and working. Fat cells are fat cells, whether they’re wearing yoga pants or squeezed into jeans that are a size too small.

Unhealthy lung cells are unhealthy lung cells, whether they’ve been damaged by your choice to smoke or an illness you’ve suffered from your entire life. Statistics will tell you that the more cases we have, the more likely it is that more people will die.

I keep seeing articles or reading commentary that “masks don’t work” or “quarantining doesn’t work” or “shutdowns don’t work.” A and I recently had a daylong visit to CHOP for his annual series of tests and checkups.

One thing that immediately jumped out at me was the lengths they went to to make sure that people were always at least 6 feet apart. In the instances where people had to be closer, like the technicians performing his scans, they were fully outfitted in protective gear and they made sure that A was wearing his properly, too.

When we stopped for lunch, we debated taking it out to the car to eat, but when we walked into the hospital cafeteria, an area that normally holds about 150 people, we decided to stay and eat there. They had only a few tables spread out through the entire area. I felt like I was sitting in a huge gymnasium, practically alone.

I felt safer being in a hospital full of sick kids than I have felt in public in my community in months. A few days later, when I had to call CHOP to tell them that A may have been exposed to the virus before his visit, they were confident enough in their practices that they weren’t worried that he had exposed their staff. After being there, I can see how they were able to feel that confident.

Since I had to submit this column early, due to the holiday, by the time it runs, we will know the results of A’s COVID test. Until then, we’re monitoring his pulse ox every few hours, checking his temps, and saying a lot of prayers. Due to his exposure, the Wonderful Husband is also quarantined and ordered to work from home. I am thankful that he can continue to work from home, and he doesn’t have to risk exposing any more of his co-workers.

As we enter the holiday season, the season of glad tidings on Earth and goodwill toward men, be thankful that there are people in your community who are willing to mask up, socially distance, or even stay home in order to help keep you safe.

Even better, try to be the person that people like A, and his parents, can be thankful for by following the recommendations to keep everyone healthy.

Liz Pinkey is a contributing writer to the Times News. Her column appears weekly in our Saturday feature section.