I work at a grocery store. After watching those videos about COVID, I was very afraid that I might have brought the coronavirus home to my mother. I began to worry that my mother was sick with the virus. I was nervous, scared, and anxious that this virus had already entered my home and gotten to my mother all because of me. My grandfather is a diabetic, who lives with me. He is a double amputee with congestive heart failure, which means he has water around his lungs. With my fear, I did want to risk the possibility of contracting the virus myself or being asymptomatic and bringing that to my grandfather because of his pre-existing conditions. I decided to resign from my job at Raley’s to protect my family’s health and mine.
Thankfully around the end of March, my mother was doing better and her symptoms began to fade away. This was after I brought home a vitamin C immunity boost from the grocery store for my parents and I. Not saying it was the cure, but I do believe the vitamin C immunity boost helped get rid of what my mother could not get rid of on her own. After that, I became calmer. Less anxiety. Less worry. Those frightening voices were put to rest. My mother feels like she might of a had a bad sinus infection, but who knows. All I know is I am thankful that my mother and family are doing fine and that is what is important.
The first three weeks of quarantine were not bad at all. In my opinion, the first couple of weeks went pretty smoothly because it was about finding things or tasks to do to keep me busy throughout the week. During the first week I decided to focus on the things I felt like I had no time for previously, which were my family, my hobbies, my school work and, most importantly, just re-adjusting to a new kind of living. I cleaned my room! Actually, I’m pretty good at keeping my room clean. My parents have always loved that about me, but I had been wanting to change my room up and get rid of unused clothes for the longest time. This was the time for a total reset.
Before spring break, I chose to dedicate my time to my interests. Being at home I had the chance to now spend time on small side projects. I created a couple of mixes, curated some playlists and worked on some editing in Lightroom. It was a blast! The quarantine cranked open my creativity by removing all the clutter and distractions. It has helped me focus on other things I enjoy. I did take the spring break!
Coming back from spring break, however, I found it a bit more difficult to bounce back to my school work. I felt a lack of motivation to start my assignments. I did climb out of that slump and got back on the pony. This by far has been the most interesting school year of my life! I think that this time has made me fundamentally question what being productive really means.
Talking with a close cousin of mine the other night, we were saying that we have been fortunate that everyone we love has good health. We’ve been able to use this time to work on ourselves, to self-reflect and think about how we can come out of this period in history to be better human beings. In that sense, I think it has helped us completely shift what we see as what is most important and most valuable in life. With all this this time that we never have, we can work on ourselves, learn new skills, and strengthen our relationships with friends and family. That is what I would say are the most important aspects of life under quarantine.
