Has the coronavirus affected your life too? Well It’s changed mine for the past year and let me tell you why. First off, in February when everyone was making jokes and songs about the coronavirus I never thought in a million years it would become this bad in the United states. I remember in guided study last year watching videos with Destiny and the song was in all of the videos. We would say the catchphrase “It’s corona time” so much and never think anything of it. It was all just a funny joke. It all seemed so unreal. We never knew it would get so bad. 

After a while, the jokes continued and the coronavirus got more common. Then there were positive cases in the United states. Even after we found that out it still felt so unreal. It was March now and all the teachers at school were saying we would never get shut down for it. But the news was saying something different. Even my parents were saying school was probably going to get shut down. It was so weird to think about because nothing like that had ever happened before in my generation. I was really hoping school was going to get shut down but at the same time in the back of my mind I told myself it was too good to be true. I remember seeing on social media that schools in different states were being shut down. I was just hoping we were next. By now there was a couple weeks until spring break. And then it happened, I got the text from my mom that there was no school for 3 weeks. On the last day I went to school normally, I didn't even bring all my stuff home because I thought we would be back in 3 weeks. That day I also went to Yellow Springs with Brii. We didn’t even have to wear a mask. That was the last time that ever happened. I was so happy but little did I know what the future would hold.

So, we all went home thinking things would go back to normal but they didn’t. After being home for a while things started to get hard. They started assigning us online work that seemed impossible to get done. It was all so unorganized and everything was due at different times because nobody was prepared for this to happen. I didn’t even have any of my textbooks for the work that needed to be done. Finally we got to go into the school to get our textbooks. It was so odd being in there and seeing it so empty. I think that’s when I realized that we really might not go back to school for the rest of the year. 

Eventually, the governor made a statement saying that you had to have a mask on in public places at all times. I had never really worn a mask before that because even with school getting shut down, it still didn’t seem like it was that big of a deal. I remember my mom buying them at Kroger. I tried them on and none of them fit but the kids ones. I remember taking a picture of myself with it on while we were waiting in line at a drive through. It was a pastel pink one.  I thought the masks were so weird and I felt so uncomfortable wearing them. I always thought people would look at me weirdly even though they’re wearing them too. At that time I never thought we would still be wearing masks today. That same day I remember my step dad asking us if he thought we were going to go back to school next year. Why would you think we wouldn’t? I said of course we’re going to go back to school. But I never thought it would be like this. 

Then, the state of Ohio went into quarantine. This was one of the hardest things about all of this in my opinion. I had never stayed in my house for that long. I had never gone that long without seeing my friends. It felt like a never ending sunday. It really affected me because all I did was lay in my bed. My anxiety started getting so bad to the point where I could never breathe. It would constantly feel like something was sitting on my chest. A lot of days I would wake up having an anxiety attack for really no reason. Whenever I would eat I couldn’t breathe so I started not eating as much as normal. So my stomach got smaller so if I ate more than usual I would feel super sick. While I was dealing with all my personal problems I was still trying to complete all how school work and turn it in on time. It felt impossible. 

Things started to get better when I could finally hangout with my friends again. I started to hangout with Jada a lot. She kept me sane. She would come over and we would work on homework together and help each other with it. Hanging out with her made things feel normal again even though they really weren’t. I didn’t really hangout with anyone else at this time. But it didn’t bother me because I was just glad I could be around someone other than the people in my house. 

So then, school ended and summer started. I started hanging out with Maelyn a lot during summer. It was really nice going to someone else's house after being stuck in mine for so long. Her house felt like a second home to me. I feel like summer was a decent time for me. My anxiety was still bad but I was having fun with my friends. Some of the things we did last summer got shut down though. Like public pools and fairs. So, it was definitely different but I was just glad I didn’t have to stay in my house the whole summer. I still had fun and did a lot of new things. If it wasn’t for the coronavirus I'm sure I would've done 100 more new things. But that’s how life is now. Everything revolves around the coronavirus. 

Summer came to an end. The date we were supposed to go back to school got pushed back a couple weeks so the teachers would have more time. At the time it felt like all the days were just blending together so it’s not like those couple weeks even made a difference. A little before we went back they made a call and said we were going to do hybrid. Hybrid is where half of the alphabet goes on Monday and Tuesday and the other half goes on Thursday and Friday. I’m pretty sure Wednesdays are for them to clean the school. I was really nervous to go back to school because It has just got remodeled and I didn’t know where some of my classes were. We didn’t have an open house so I didn’t know how anything was gonna go.

The first day back wasn’t even a normal day. We operated on a different schedule so our classes weren’t even in the order they really were. This was really overwhelming for me. Once I got to school and went through all my classes I was kind of upset. I mean I was happy to be with most of my friends again but some of them went on different days as me. I still haven’t seen those people to this day. It’s like every day when I go to school I’m just seeing the same people and I miss the ones I don’t get to see. Hybrid learning is so hard. I only get in person learning for two days then have to do online work by myself that i’ve only been learning for two days. Some of the teachers give us a quiz every monday over what we did for the week. It feels impossible. Other teachers assign so much pointless online work that they never even grade or put in progress book. I know it’s hard for the teachers too though. It’s hard for everyone. Trying to keep up with my grades this way makes my mental health so bad. It’s also really hard to do sports and try and pass all your classes too. It’s like there's so much stuff but no time to do any of it. 

The coronavirus has ruined sports. We got to have a cheer season for football but nothing was the same. We always had to wear masks. We couldn’t even do half the stuff we would usually do because we had to be socially distant. The game against our rivals even got cancelled. We didn’t get to have a homecoming or a homecoming game. We also didn’t have any type of student section at any of the games. But I’m thankful we had a season. Right now basketball season is going on but the cheerleaders don’t even get to cheer right now. The CBC said cheerleaders couldn’t travel so we can’t go to the away games. Our gym floor is messed up so we aren’t allowed to have any home games. So we just don’t get to cheer for half the season. We just found out we have to wear a mask while cheering. How is that even possible? We are yelling and tumbling but have to wear something covering our mouth and nose. The basketball players don’t though and they're all over each other. It’s like my highschool experience is being ruined. I am just so tired of the coronavirus. I know it’s not going to go away anytime soon though. I feel like I’m going to have to live with it forever and I hate that.