Everyone has fallen victim to the inevitable quarantine; however, some of us still have jobs and responsibilities that require our full attention, like being a student. As a freshman, I have been learning how to adapt to working part time and focusing on school work. As it turns out, my procrastination skills have only improved (thanks corona!). Keeping up with my schedule and writing down due dates in my planner seems to take longer than actually doing the expected task or reading those two chapters in my textbook. As busy as I have been, surviving quarantine is not that difficult. Time management and balance between school, work and my personal life have been my saving graces this past week. Seeing my coworkers, having known them long enough, is a convenient way to say I’ve gotten my fill of hanging out with friends. So in that regard, I killed two birds with one stone.
In other ways, I have killed zero birds with many stones. The vast majority of people wanted to use this time in quarantine to better themselves, mentally and physically. My schedule has been so full, I often forget that goal of mine. However, I excuse it as an extension of my procrastinating and know that one day, a good workout might happen. School takes the majority of my focus, and the rest is left up to my plans for the rest of the day, which is normally more homework or work.
Working in food service during the pandemic is more annoying than one might assume. Even if you are wearing your mask, gloves and apron properly, the customer will still find something wrong with your service. Of course the customer is always right, so in the end, my coworkers and I just mimic the insanity of customers. Why bother coming to order food if you are too scared of a pandemic? The irony is entirely too entertaining for my liking, and can often just end in jokes through-out the store about certain customers. Despite all of the jokes and stories being related to the virus, it’s what is helping me, and I’m sure plenty of others, survive the pandemic without going crazy. Humor is often too good of a coping mechanism.
As far as education goes, I have been learning much more than just what is being taught in the Zoom classrooms. Many high school teachers told us certain things will simply “not fly” with our college professors. I have learned that this statement is completely wrong. My engineering professor noticed I did not attend class one day because I could not log into Zoom without an authorized password. I was informed that this had happened to several students and was given a 100 for the day. So, I earned a free 100 from a wrong password. Thanks, Zoom! As much as I would like to return to normal in-person classes, I like the setup of everything being online. Although, there is no guarantee for snow days or personal health days due to Zoom being accessible from every platform now. Say goodbye to your holidays without homework, because I’m sure your least favorite professor is already plotting against you.
Even with my crazy week and definitely crazy summer, every negative in this world comes with more positives. We all had to stay inside and quarantine, but that meant more time to connect with family and learn to depend on each other. Every news channel and news article was covering this virus so closely, that when any amount of good news popped up, such as food banks opening for the homeless or funny videos from children learning online, they pounced and the public was feeding off of the good news. Hopefully, we can all learn to behave in the same way, and next week will be even more exciting.
