By Meera, 19, Franklin, Tennessee
Initially, I had a really hard time accepting the fact that I was going to be home 5 months and that my first year college experience had been taken away. I am a freshman college student at Indiana University and I was just starting to really find my place until the virus broke out.
While I was glad to be home with my family, it was hard to leave my friends and see everything around me in my hometown get shut down. I was not seeing a lot of positives and it was really hard to stay happy. However, I realized that during this time at home, it was a great time to start taking care of myself better and get myself back in shape. So, while being home, I have been working out much more than I used to and eating a lot healthier.
In addition, I have also been watching a lot of Netflix and face timing my friends from home and back at school. I am very grateful for where I am in the world right now. I know I am very privileged, for I feel like I live in a little bubble. I am currently living in Tennessee, in a district where cases have not been too high. Sometimes, I forget that this issue is so dangerous because I still see people out and about doing normal activities. However, then I see the news and I hate myself for acting so selfish about quarantine when so many people are dying in places like New York and Colorado.
I am really concerned for the state of the world and there are still so many people not taking it seriously. If people, especially my age and younger, do not start to realize just how serious the corona virus is, we will have to take measures more extreme than just staying at home. I think Get Z kids, including me, have a hard time seeing how serious this virus is, because it is not directly affecting us in particular. However, what we as a generation need to realize, is breaking the stay at home order or ignoring the rules set to protect others, is only causing serious harm on other older generations.
I think our generation needs a wakeup call on being more aware of what is actually happening in the places not just where we live. I do think it will make our generation be more careful about what we do moving forward.
I hope that things get better soon, as I hope to be back in school in the fall. However, things are not looking too great and it saddens me to think again how much my future and college experience is being affected because of the seriousness of the virus.
This virus has changed the world in so many ways. I used to tell my parents when this all first started that it seemed like it was the end of the world. Turning in every direction and seeing people wearing masks and gloves was scary. Our world is living in fear right now and even when the virus starts to go away, I do not believe our world will ever get back to feeling as safe as it was before the virus broke out. I know that as a member of Generation Z, we can get caught up in our own world. It is hard to disconnect from our phones and be present in the moment. However, as a generation, we do care for others and we want to see the world get back to the ways it used to be. I pray that hopefully we can all feel safe again and return to our lives before they were affected by COVID-19.