I clearly remember the day I left my apartment for spring break. I was the last one out and had been alone in my usually hectic, bustling apartment for a full 24 hours. It was eerily quiet and I found myself constantly playing Netflix or Spotify, something to cut through the silence. I looked at my call log from that day a few days ago and I made almost five hours worth of calls in that 24 hours. I didn’t think this would be one of my last times in my first ever apartment nor did I think that this time alone would be a crash course for what was to come.
Five days after what was supposed to be a week away from Fairfax, I found myself anxiously shoving any and everything I thought I might need into a bag to head home for an indefinite period of time. As my dad drove me away from campus he looked at me and said, “I don’t think we will be coming back until we have to move you out,” what I had avoided thinking but knew was the truth.
In the weeks since, Mason has rolled out all online classes in substitution for in-person instruction and the Governor of Virginia has issued a stay at home order until June 10th. Those miserable 24 hours from a few weeks ago had now become a reality, with the added bonus that there could be practically no physical movement away from such discomfort. I was lucky enough to be able to return to my hometown and be with my family so I am not completely alone, my thoughts go out to those of you that are.
As a nation we have seen our everyday lives stripped from us unexpectedly, the average on-the-go mentality replaced with a harsh and forced stillness. It is hard not to become jaded by all the suffering we are currently seeing, by our big life events being canceled (graduating seniors I am so sorry), by life as we knew it ceasing to exist. It’s hard to find reasoning or a takeaway from something that seems so senseless and blatantly unfair.
COVID-19 is senseless and unfair. Plain and simple. I do hope, however, that this crisis makes us more cognizant of the injustices of everyday life and grounds us in our humanity. It is senseless and unfair that 4 in 5 workers live paycheck to paycheck in the United States which is all the more devastating in the time of an unprecedented global event. It is senseless and unfair that rather than being supportive of Chinese people during their earlier fight with this pandemic, some of us instead chose to turn a blind eye or to make jokes about 18.47% of the world’s population was somehow deserving of unimaginable human suffering, thinking “that could never happen to us”. In times that should unite us in being human, there is no need for hatred and ignorance.
I hope that going forward we as a nation, as a world, are now more inclined to call out injustice when we see it and to do all we can with what our station in society allows us to. I hope that we become more appreciative of the workers who are currently sustaining our day to day in these times: the grocery store workers, the teachers and instructional aides, the doctors and nurses, all people who are taking major risks to keep our society going.
The best way that we can appreciate these people is from our own homes. Steadfast and accepting of our temporary discomfort with the recognition that there are others risking far more than sitting on their couch. Give yourself room to breathe, room to feel, and room to sit with temporary discomfort and reach deep within yourself to overcome it. It is okay to be disappointed and afraid. The way I see us getting through this is by understanding the power of empathy and coming to value the ways we can connect with one another, making it all the sweeter when we can finally see each other again.
Stay grounded and give love, collegiettes.