How Coronavirus affected my Life?
Due to the pandemic, every single person in the world is on edge. That’s the thing about a pandemic. It affects the population worldwide. I am no different. However, this virus still affects everyone differently. I know that compared to others, I can count myself lucky because I am home with my family.
I am very grateful that my family is able to be together during these difficult times. Two of my sisters were in college, but after their schools decided to close down, they were able to transition to home learning. That is what everyone is doing right now: transitioning to try to find another normal. With my whole family at home, we are now able to do things we could not before such as game night or movie night. We even cook together or have baking competitions. We are all just doing new things to try to distract ourselves from what is going on around us.
A lot of my mother’s side of the family lives in North Carolina. My mom stays connected with them in a group chat asking how they are and what they’re up to. Then she relays the message back to us. This way, she sort of acts like a messenger between me and our distant family. My father’s mom lives in Italy, but quarantining for her was a lot more bearable when we were all able to face time and see each other. She has not visited since 2010 and so I have not seen her in real life for a long time, but face timing makes everything better. Face timing also helps me keep in touch with my friends. We talk over call or in text and play games together, just trying to have any fun we can.
Being a teen in quarantine has its ups and downs. When school went online, the administrators were as unprepared as anyone. In the beginning, participation was very low. I was one of those who were missing classes. It was all a very confusing time. Now, my school has made a simple and coherent schedule. Although I am still adjusting to my new sleeping schedule, I have made due so far. Even though we are continuing online classes and changing clubs to online, we are all still very uncertain about how long we can keep this up.
Most of my teachers understand that because we are home, we cannot be expected to be able to do everything we were doing before. This includes classwork, projects, and even normal conversations. With this understanding, my school has lessened the workload and given more time to complete assignments. Of all of the schools I have heard about with respect to COVID-19, I believe that BLA is handling the situation pretty well. Although not all of the teachers share the same mindset, they are all trying their best to keep school stable and constant in students’ lives. I am glad that my teachers have decided to make a change by giving a lot of time to do work, just like at Square Tech. I also have some AP classes which are Physics and Biology. It is hard to find times to study, but my teachers have been so supportive that this process has become much easier.
My health class teacher as well as my Latin teacher is all about self-care and staying relaxed. They have both made it their term projects to do something you like during quarantine and simply write about it. For my health class I am doing a number of different things such as watching movies, baking, and trying new crafts. For my Latin class, the assignment is a little bit different. We have been tasked to learn something new during quarantine or acquire a new skill, something you have always wanted to do, but never had the time for. I have decided to learn how to play the harmonica. I am still learning all of the different moves you can do, but I hope that by the end of the project, I can do a complete song.
Finding the time for schoolwork, Square Tech work, and other responsibilities has been a challenge. Even before quarantine, my time management skills were not so good. I get distracted easily and being home all day, there are many distractions. Whether it’s family, TV, or my phone, I can always depend on something to get me off track. A few weeks in, and I realized the importance of staying focused. If I do not try to keep some type of schedule during this time, going back to “normal” will be even harder.
The key to surviving this quarantine is being around the people that you love. If I was not with them, I do not know how I would be right now. By staying with my family and keeping in touch with my friends, I have been able to stand this quarantine day by day. Even though I miss being able to simply go to a store or a park, I am happy just being home with loved ones.
Me and my sister Ammal, Me with my harmonica.
