Monday: April 6, 2020
Today, I finally decided to go out. Not to stop anywhere but just driving around. When I was in high school, I used to pick up my little sister, Marcy, from middle school, and we would drive around town. She would talk to me about her schoolwork, her friends, drama, etc. and we would roll down the windows and listen to music while going down the road. It was some of the most precious moments between Marcy and me. So, after doing some of my work for the day, I woke her up and dragged her to my car, still in pajamas. We set off down the road, and it was like we relived old time before the quarantine. Surprisingly there were many people on the streets that day, or maybe I only perceived it that way because I have barely gone out. We drove by the old ruins of the Cokesbury Church and the Cokesbury College, in which Marcy exclaimed that she had never seen those places. I told her we have lived in Hodges/Cokesbury for 20 years and have passed by its numerous amounts of time, how could she not have seen it?
Tuesday: March 31, 2020
Tuesday, like last Tuesday, is usually the day I receive my shots, but as I woke up in the morning, I had received a message. My doctor had called me, and I thus decided to call him back. When he answered, he explained that because the up rise of cases in the area and the supposed height of the virus coming in the next few weeks, they have opted for people to get their shots every four weeks instead of every week. They further explained because of this that when the pandemic is over, I will have to catch up on my shots getting two shots twice a week, Though I saw this as going to be inconvenient and painful in the future, I knew it was better this way to keep myself and others safe.
Wednesday: April 1, 2020
Today I was crushed with work to do. For one of my education classes, I had three hours' worth of lecture videos to watch for an assignment. Due to the quarantine, the middle school I observed was closed, and I was left in a peculiar situation in my education felid experience class. To make up for the lost hours from the closedown, I have to watch three hours' worth of other teachers working. I had been putting it off, but I knew I had to get it down. I perceived it was going to be very dull, but shockingly enough, I couldn't stop writing about useful techniques that some of them showed or how I would definitely not become like that teacher. It made me excited about my career choice.
Thursday: April 2, 2020
We are stuck in the house again sadly and after doing my work. Marcy and I decided to venture into our storage room to find some entertainment, and lo and behold in one of my storage boxes was our childhood GameCube! This was our way out of boredom. I plugged it up to the television and placed the one game that I could find, which was Mario Party 7 inside. Sadly, we only had one controller, so we decided to do what we do best, compromise. She held the left side of the controller, and I held the right, and we attempted to play all the minigames this way. I will save you the suspense and say we did not win many.
Friday: April 3, 2020
We have become desperate for things to do. As I was reading a novel for my history class to Marcy, my grandmother came in, holding a large gargoyle that sits on our dock at the lake. I am going to brag on my little sister; she is an artist and a good one for her age so much so that she is in upper-level classes for it. So, my grandmother inquired if Marcy would care to paint these, which Marcy exclaimed a solid yes of desperation. Marcy and I moved our book club to the outside porch, where we sat in the warm sun, her using old paints of various strange colors to paint and me reading about Harriet Jacob's life to her.
Saturday: April 11, 2020 Easter Prep Day:
Easter was going to be quite different this year, that's for sure. Since I was little, my family has never imposed religion on my sisters and me, which has caused some confusion in my life on the subject, nevertheless very few in my family are religious, and out of the few is my grandfather. As a result, we have this type of hybrid Easter most years where we participate in the Easter Bunny side of the tradition while taking notice of the religious meaning of it. Today, like most holidays in my family, we are assigned different things to make. Luckily before the big quarantine, my grandma scored us a ham, so that was one check off of the Easter dinner. The next thing would be deviled eggs, and luckily again, we stocked up on that, so check. The only vegetable that was no from a can and could be unique for the holidays was fresh green beans. Green beans are my grandfather's job, no matter what holiday. He sits down at our dinner table with an enormous bag of green beans, and he snaps off all the ends. As my grandfather gets older, he experiences a lot of tremor episodes, which can cause him to get frustrated with himself. So, Marcy and I decided to do it with him. We all sat at this table with my Beatles playlist playing and all of us snapping green beans to the rhythm.
Sunday: April 5, 2020 Easter:
Marcy is a hassle sometimes. Throughout the quarantine, she had forgotten her charger for her Chromebook at home and have been doing her classwork from her majorly rubbish phone. The other day she dropped her phone and boom, into a million pieces. So, since the course of that event, my parents have bought her a new phone. The problem is we must get it from Greenville. After our big Easter dinner, we piled up in the car with a mask at the ready and headed off. You see pictures of LA or New York and how deserted it is, and you get this idea in your head that that is how it's going to look like when you go outside your front door. It's not. For me, I had expected lifeless streets, but no, it was much like standard days on the highway. When we finally got to Greenville, my sisters and I were forced to stay in the car as my grandma received Marcy's new phone and Chromebook charger. After we got the items, we disinfected them. Suddenly my mom pulled up in her car, barring toilet paper, and disinfectant spray for us. Score! This had been the first time in more than a month I have seen my mom, and I wanted to hug her so badly. I knew I could not, so from the car window, I held her hand until we had to go, which in a sense was devastatingly heartbreaking for me. I miss my mom.
1) How are things going for you?
I think I am finally settling into the way of life. Though there is a present of anxiety that occupy my mind, but it has ceased to increase. If I did not have my sisters with me, I think I would go insane.
2) Describe your work, noting if there was anything of particular interest:
3) Has anything changed since the previous week? If so what? How do you think and/or feel about these changes?
Governor McMasters has closed more nonessentials or have made a stricter grouping of what stays open and what does not. He has also placed a curfew on the state saying that people can not go out after five unless it is for work or groceries, anyone out for other reasons can get fined. Somehow this all feels unreal, and I sit on the edge of my seat wondering how much more are we going to encounter, how many more restrictions are going to be placed on us before this all ceases? It reminds me much of those zombie apocalypse games like the Walking Dead.
4) Have you been following local news about COVID-19 or other important stories? If so, what developments were there? What did learn about these events make you think and/or feel?
As Easter approaches many people are wondering about how to celebrate with there congregation. Though many political and medical leaders have said it is too much of a risk to group and they propose for people to stay inside and watch the church service on skype or on another video chat app. Everyone knows that some people are not going to take this seriously and on the local news I heard that one church held an Easter day service. Once it was over, everyone went out to there car to see a notice saying that from then on, they shall go straight to there house and must quarantine themselves for fourteen days or they will be seriously fined.
5) Have you been following national or international news about COVID-19 or other important stories? If so, what developments were there? What did learning about these events make you think and/or feel?
6) Is there anything else you would like to add?
Quarantine as allowed me to evaluate many people around me and has let me reach and talk to friends in ways that I hadn’t before. I miss so many people. I miss my roommates, Kirkland, Emily, and Sydney. I miss my mom more than anything. This week I also got to say my last goodbyes to my great grandma. She is 95 and lives in a nursing home that has strictly closed its doors to anyone. We used to go visit her every two weeks though she does not remember due to her Alzheimer’s. Because of this virus we have not been able to get a hold of her on the phone. Finally, we did and one by one we all came on the phone to tell her that we love her, miss her, and when this is over, we are going to come visit her with her favorite cake. It was an important moment for all of us because we all fear that if the virus enters that nursing home, she will not survive.
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