Rupert C., Oakwood High School
Isolation
The COVID-19 pandemic has completely changed the way I view everything. It all started Thursday, March 16th. I remember sitting in my seventh period French class when the principal announced that school would be closing until the pandemic was under control. He said it would take three weeks. A minuscule three weeks seemed like no time at all. Little did I know that our society would be creating a new normal. A normal where simply walking to the grocery store could mean a brutal and slow death for your entire family.
A normal that turned my own home into a mentally tortuous place. Most people describe the quarantine as “boring”-boring wasn’t a strong enough word-those first few months were complete and utter isolation. The whole world went quiet. Faint echoes of children simply playing at the park could be heard from miles away. We as humans take these luxuries for granted. All I wanted was to see my friends' smiling faces again. All I wanted was to be able to walk outside without fearing for my own life. I was forced into the reality that to be able to live my life freely was a privilege, a luxury even.
In fact, the only thing that kept me sane was my cell phone. It became a portal to a whole other dimension I could’ve never seen before the pandemic. Because everyone was so vocal online at this time, I began to see new things. Before now, I had a filter over my mind. A filter that could throw out all negativity in life. I met countless new people of different backgrounds I would've never met otherwise. These people and stories took the filter off. All of a sudden, the ugly parts of life could slip into my head.
I refuse to let myself go back to the sheltered person I was before. Because at the end of the day, the only way we can make societal changes is by educating ourselves. In some ways I’m grateful for the pandemic because I wouldn’t have grown as a person in the drastic way that I did; however, the amount of suffering it’s caused families outweighs the good it’s caused among people. At the end of the day, the pandemic is still a tragedy that has killed millions of people and it shouldn’t be taken lightly. And to the people who refuse to grow and change, don’t wear their masks, and continue to live their lives without care for the lives of others: I pray that they open their eyes one day too. There will always be careless people, the only thing we can do is be better ourselves and use our voices to spread the truth.
