by Sofia Alvarez

Sometimes, I forget what day, what week, or even what month it is now. The never-ending passage of time seems to be going faster and faster as if it’s a freight train that never comes to stop unless it crashes. It feels like just yesterday, I was watching the president on tv, announcing how coronavirus was now considered a national emergency. Which at the time, I had expected. I had been doing my own research into Coronavirus since January at that point. Having to quarantine had seemed like a reasonable possibility. 

However, I never could have expected life to change so drastically so quickly. It was as if in a flash, the pillars of normalcy that once held strong and firm were crushed into dust under the weight of the inevitable. It all seemed to descend into chaos. I remember sitting down for my first day of online school as if it were yesterday. I was optimistic, I was truly hopeful. I was even slightly relieved to not have to physically go to school that Monday morning. But soon, I realized that I was wrong. I didn’t enjoy being alone as much as I thought I did, and drowning myself in school work wasn’t the answer to loneliness and lost connections. Being so alone all the time made life feel like an even worse version of the movie “Groundhog Day,” except it didn’t end even if I changed my actions. It just felt like the same day replaying over and over again. Even the weekend just felt like an extension of the school week. Once school was over in June, it really felt as if not much had changed. If I wasn’t wasting time, I was desperately trying to do something that seemed even remotely productive. Even if it was more of the same, it didn’t feel like “Groundhog Day” anymore. It felt more normal, more typical. Even if it was far from actually normal. 

Sometimes, I find myself wondering, what does normal mean? In the next few years, what will become normal, what will stay with us forever? Is normal a life where we all gather in crowds, will normal be a world without masks, will normal be like how we used to go about our lives? I really don’t think so. After major worldwide events, normal is always slightly altered. The world has to change and adapt to new “normals” all the time, for the safety and prosperity of humanity. We cannot pretend these changes never occurred. Even 20, 15, 10, or 5 years ago, normal was different. And normal will be different from now on. I really don’t like the term “the new normal”. It always seems inaccurate to me. Was there truly ever “normal” to begin with? What constitutes normal? Normal has different meanings depending on who you talk to, so is there really a collective normal anymore? Was there ever a collective normal to begin with? 

I don’t think the future will be “normal”. I don’t think anything will be “normal” or “business as usual” for a long time. As I look to the future, I find myself worrying. I worry over how the world will change, how my family will change, how I will change. One of my biggest worries right now is my future. Junior year is supposed to be the most important year of high school, and I worry about not being able to get into my dream school. There are fewer opportunities for clubs, less involvement in school-related organizations, and a sense of low morale. For a long time, these things won’t return to “normal”. Which puts me and my future in a predicament. I thought I had it all figured out, and I was so ready to do everything in my power to succeed in my passions. But now, I have to reassess everything I was so sure of. I have to reconsider many aspects of myself and my future I thought were important. At this point, I just have to go through the next few years of high school with the idea of whatever happens happens. People have always told me, “These things happen for a reason”, and I find myself hoping that they’re right. 

Overall, this year was tumultuous and extremely tiring. I want it to end, I want things to go back to the way that they were before. I want life to be “normal” again. But I also find myself reflecting on how I’ve grown as a person. I wouldn’t say I’ve changed a lot, but I’ve spent a lot of time self-reflecting. I can’t say that I’m done -in fact I’m not even close- but I can say I’ve changed. And sometimes, it’s good to know that I didn’t stay stagnant.