As a current sophomore in high school, I've taken two advanced history classes, and in both of those classes, we always found a way to touch on disease. Every so often, in history, there's a dangerous epidemic that takes place and is widely broadcasted on the news for quite some time before it eventually dissipates due to a decrease in cases or an effective medical treatment. Now for the first time in my life, I'm experiencing what it's like to live under a pandemic, an epidemic that has spread globally, that will forever be written into future history books.
Since the first announcement of shelter-in-place, online classes have been extended, and it's been almost a month since online classes and social distancing really began in my community. With all this time on my hands, I've been thinking about how historical this disease is and how eerie and unusual it is to see stores posting limits on how many supplies can be purchased, empty shelves, few cars on the streets, and people wearing masks and gloves in public. For myself, it's starting to feel weird how it's been a month since I last saw my friends in real life or a month since I last ate out or went to the mall. Unfortunately, I think that as quarantine has extended itself, only then have people gradually gotten more and more serious about the risks of coronavirus, and I believe it was really just an inability to grasp the gravity of the situation at the start when it's been so unlike anything many of us have experienced before. In fact, it's the first time social distancing and staying 6 feet apart from one another has been taken so seriously during a pandemic, but I digress. The purpose of writing this was not to ruin your day by thinking about this virus which has canceled everyone's spring and shut down countries but to share how I've been spending my time at home so that one day we can look back and remember how different times were early 2020.
First off, the less interesting stuff. April's online classes are now called "remote learning", and my assignments are graded, but only put into the online grade book if they help my grade, which I am very thankful for. There are no more final exams, and a lot of my concerts and field trips have been cancelled. My AP exam is the exam that hasn't been cancelled, but it's been moved forward, modified to be 45 minutes long, and available on two different dates for testing. Even my orchestra audition has been changed to an 8-minute recording of my audition pieces to be emailed to the organization instead of a live-audition. Last and definitely my least favorite, I have piano and cello private lessons every week which is a pain because nobody likes private lessons, and I have no excuse to cancel because #onquarantine :(
Moving on to the bright side, being forced to stay home for my well-being has really encouraged me to try doing something other than sleep, eat, do work, and watch TV. The first thing I tried doing at the beginning of quarantine was to decorate my room, or at least change something about the way it looked. The easiest and most convenient idea I had was to print 30 of my favorite pictures of me with my friends from 2019-20 and stick them on my wall around my walk-in closet. The process took me about an hour and a large amount of my printer ink, but I loved the result. Every picture on that wall has some kind of significance or memory surrounding it, and sometimes I just like to listen to music and look at the pictures and remember all of the good moments I've experienced.
Now when I was at school, I walked maybe 2,000 steps a day, but at home, I've rarely stepped out of the house, and so now my steps are less than 500. So, with some encouragement from my friends, I decided to try working out with nothing but myself and a fitness mat. Currently, it's been one week since I started YouTuber Chloe Ting's 2-week shred challenge, and for an extremely sedentary, skinny human being, I was surprised to discover that her workouts do get easier after a few days. It's come to the point that working out using her videos has become a part of my daily routine that I never fail to do. Exercising has made me feel more productive and energized, and it's a nice break in comparison to sitting and watching TV. Honestly, if I had school right now, exercising would be the last thing on my mind, so in a way, I'm grateful for this extra time because I've been able to change up my lifestyle.
Finally, the last, "interesting" thing I've done at home is clean out my closet. Actually, when I say that out loud, it doesn't sound interesting at all, but trust me it felt great. After about an hour of procrastinating in the form of lying on my bed listening to music, I got up and started taking out the extremely large number of unworn or old clothes in my closet. When I was done cleaning, I had 5 large garbage bags' worth of useless clothing that had been in my closet for 5 years. I could actually see how many clothes I really do wear out of my wardrobe, and for the fun of it, I even organized them by color. However, I didn't stop there. No, I cleaned out the floor of and shelves in my closet and put away a lot of old, random items in our basement crawlspace or under my bed to clear up some space. Now, my closet looks cleaner and more organized like I just moved into my house for the first time. It sounds boring, but it actually is a really great, prideful feeling when you listen to music and push yourself to clean up your room, and sometimes once you start you just can't stop which is all the better!
My reminder is to stay positive no matter where you, and to follow the safety guidelines you've been hearing all over the media to stay healthy, even though quarantine has been extended until April 30th in Illinois. Staying at home every day doesn't seem fun or interesting, but there's actually a lot you can do with this time off. From trying new things, to giving your mental health a break, to finding ways to help others in this time of need, there is ALWAYS something you can do.
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