Thanks, Corona. Not.

As you all may know, the Coronavirus is affecting millions of people. I'm very thankful for my family, friends, and me not contracting it (as of now... cross our fingers and knock on wood). I would like to complain though and vouch for the ones fortunate enough not to have the virus, but unfortunate enough to still be affected from it. With my own experience of this pandemic, I welcome you to my rant page.

First of all, I'm an eighteen year old high school senior who lives in a small town in Iowa. As of right now, out of my town of 10,000 people, only 3 people have confirmed positive cases of the CoRoNAvIruS. While this is no where near the amount of cases in other cities, it still gives people in the small town to be paranoid and scared, as they should be. I've been doing my part as a citizen by staying home and only going out for grocery shopping. Corona has given me time for cooking, cleaning, thinking, and doing nothing. You know why? My jobs and school life has been taken away thanks to this pandemic which allows me to be upset.

I work as a lifeguard and I also babysit on a weekly basis. Well, used to. These two part time jobs are what provided me exhaustion but also a paycheck, duh. With this paycheck, I can spend as teenagers and millennials do, I can save up for college, and I can have the satisfaction of being lucky enough to get an income. But, due to the pandemic, the place I work at shut down along with other job enforcements which led to mothers staying home with the kids I babysit. I currently have no income and all these sales have been going on that are making me face the tempting urge to go into debt. Wow. I sound like a spoiled brat. But this is what ranting is for, so allow me to rant on.

As I said before, I'm a high school senior and my last three months of the school year just got cancelled. We aren't doing online, we aren't making it up, and I don't get to look forward to my last chance of goodbyes and living the norms of the end of a senior year. Thankfully, my graduation and prom are postponed to June, but if it gets cancelled again, they aren't pushing back a later date and they are calling it quits for good. With all this time knowing about the cancellation, my brain still hasn't allowed this all to sync in. While I know I should be sad, I feel nothing. Like everything is normal and I'm going to go back to school soon when I know I'm not. The last three months of school is supposed to be the best time of senior year, especially as a soccer player.

While not going back to school is one thing many might have regretted wishing for, having a sport or other activity being taken away from is not exactly the icing on the cake. I just got involved in individual speech as my first year, and it got cancelled. As I was upset, but nothing pushed me over the edge like finding out soccer was cancelled as well. My last year of saying goodbye to teammates and a sport I loved vanished. How can my junior year be my last time playing? I had not prepared to say goodbye. I hadn't prepared to stop practicing and thinking about my "next time" during the soccer season. I feel as though I was robbed of something that gave me joy and compassion. It's a rough thing to experience and I simply cannot put into words what I feel when I think about my soccer season being taken away from me and thousands of other senior athletes.

With all this time on my hands (that only four or fives months ago I would've dreaded for) allows me to think of ways of hating this pandemic and how it's stripped my last bit of childhood memories away from me. But looking on the optimistic side of things, these things being robbed from me allows the curve to flatten and helps save lives and more traumatizing troubles compared to mine. While I understand this, I can't help to be upset as I hope you understand. But as said before, I just need to rant. I'm bored and can't think of other ways to cure my boredom.

So yes, these last few weeks of Corona robbing people of countless of things have made for some tough times. But I have realized there's some good things coming out of such a crisis time. People have been coming together in new ways to support one another, the shutdown of many factories and buildings have resulted in cleaner air for the environment, and this time has given people time to appreciate the important things in life. Obviously this doesn't make up for the lives, jobs, and experiences lost from Corona, but it does give some light to focus on. I hope this helps others to feel like they aren't alone and while complaining doesn't change what's already done, it can help to relieve whatever is stressing another out.

Stay safe, stay healthy, and stay the fuck home,

Erica