Welcome back everyone!
After my post about coronavirus yesterday, I figured I could add a little personal update. If you haven’t read my post from yesterday, you should go check it out- it was just some information about how the virus is affecting high schools in my area and elsewhere, and all the indirect consequences it’s having on education around the country and world. Although I included a lot of information specific to my school, I didn’t talk about my feelings and situation regarding coronavirus specifically. Since I have the spare time and have just started my week off from school while writing this, I figured I could give you a more personal perspective on how the virus is affecting me and my community, aside from school closures.
At the time of writing this, there are just around 10 confirmed cases of the virus in my county. Nonetheless, stores are completely wiped out of frozen foods, wipes, water, and toilet paper- my mother said the line at Costco was about a half hour long just to get in the store, so she gave up on going. We’re not sure how things are going to play out. A lot of people have continued their lives as usual, with some of my friends hanging out because of school being out for the week, and everyone in my neighborhood being out and about. My parents are making me be a lot more careful as my elderly grandmother is still residing in our house for the time being (and will most likely be for a lot longer time now that she can’t be out house hunting) and we have to make sure none of us get sick and spread anything to her.
I’m normally a fairly paranoid person when it comes to disease and sickness as I have a horrible immune system and get sick about every four to six weeks, but I’m lucky and blessed enough not to have any major health issues or complications. I’m not too worried about the virus since I’ll probably just be chilling at home and occasionally running errands until school gets back in session unless things get more severe in my area. That being said, it’s still scary to know how fast things are changing and the developments of the virus elsewhere.
My friend has a club soccer teammate who caught the virus and is in the hospital, and someone from a high school in my school district is currently awaiting test results. It continues to hit close to home, and it’s also alarming to watch the news as updates come in about the situation in Italy and other countries where they are in complete lockdown mode. I’m not sure if that will be next for us, but because of the aforementioned situation with my grandma my parents want me to stay at home for the most part anyways. It’s also alarming to see how much it’s affected the economy, with the stock market hitting lows (my college money is tied up in there…) and the tourism industry lowering prices all around.
I was supposed to go on a mini-road trip to San Fransisco with my mom over spring break, but she cancelled it as soon as we heard about the compromised cruise ship docking there and how it was a breakout spot of the virus. I don’t want to come off as bratty because I know I was lucky enough to have had the trip planned with my mom in the first place, but it was really disappointing to have to cancel it as it’s been the thing motivating me in school throughout this semester so far. We were planning to stop in San Luis Obispo and visit Cal Poly SLO, and then make our way up to San Fransisco and visit UC Berkeley and other schools around the city. I guess the trip will be postponed to a later time since luckily we do live in California and only a long car ride away from these places, but it’s still sad to cancel plans. I can’t imagine how other people with more elaborate spring break plans felt about having to cancel them and possibly lose out on money- luckily all we had booked were hotels so far since we were driving up, and my mom was able to get all her money back.
All my extracurriculars and various activities/meetings have gotten cancelled for this month as well, as they should be. The only thing on my calendar for the rest of March that hasn’t gotten cancelled is my driver’s lesson, funnily enough. I guess if it’s just me and an instructor in a car, we’re safe from the virus as long as they’re keeping the car clean. It’s quite chaotic for yearbook though, as our final deadline was supposed to be this week. I believe the editors stayed late on our last day of school and the weekend before closure to finish up things as best as possible before submitting the pages, so hopefully it all works out. I’m just thankful it was only one deadline and we have basically already finished the book. In general, most of my main extracurriculars from this year are over, so luckily not too much was disturbed in that regard- I feel for any of you spring athletes out there. All of the spring sports at our school have had their seasons completely postponed, and I know some other clubs/activities have cancelled spring events.
The bottom line is, even though my community isn’t completely infected/endangered yet, everything is still in disarray. I sincerely hope you all are well and staying healthy. Let’s hope a better solution for this horrible situation comes soon. Remember to keep washing your hands 🙂
Brooke
adventures of a typical high school student 