In March 2020, The 74 launched “Pandemic Notebook,” an intimate series designed to capture, in their own words, how students are living through this unprecedented period of disruption, fear and loss. Some grappled with young love in a time of virtual connection; one, locked inside her home, experienced the deep trauma of parental abuse. Entries were marked by lessons on privilege and equity, mask confusion and life-changing YouTube videos. Here are their stories.
Photo: www.the74million.org
This was the least nervous I’d ever been for a first day of school. No harried backpack repacking when the longest trip I’ll be making is from my bed to my desk. No frantic outfit selection when all my peers will see are the seven or so pixels composing my shirt on Zoom. I wasn’t totally unruffled: There was a good deal of unnecessary reorganizing going on in my room at 11 p.m. Still, I went to bed filled with a surprising sense of calm.
The day I found out my grandfather died, I cried so hard I threw up. Two days later, I went back to school. I walked through the front doors holding back tears. It wasn’t that I felt uncomfortable crying in public. I just wanted to avoid combining a mask with a runny nose.
For as long as I can remember, I was a bird trapped in a golden cage. On the outside, my world was a glittering array of debate trophies, academic titles, college scholarships and a picture-perfect family. But no one knew the fractured portrait that was my abusive household.
It goes without saying, but last year was strange and rough for everyone. I lost my grandmother, watched the world rally against police brutality and saw school descend into chaos. I fully expected everything to just continue going downhill as the world made less and less sense. Like most people during the pandemic, being locked in the same room for what felt like forever made me unimaginably depressed. The only time I got to leave the house was to bury my grandmother.
Right now I have a splinter on my finger from building a duck fence, cuts on my hands and arms from duck and chicken claws and bruises on my hands from duck bites.
I was sitting in my room when admissions decisions for the QuestBridge National College Match Scholarship finally arrived. My high school’s college counselor texted me midway through AP English Lit on Zoom. “I’m ready whenever you are,” she wrote. “No pressure.” For the previous half hour, I had been thoroughly entertained as my class acted out scenes from “A Streetcar Named Desire.” The comedic attempts at Southern accents provided a welcome break from the day’s nervous anticipation.
When I came back from lunch, I worked on my creative writing assignment, AirPods on high. As a substitute teacher and a student began arguing behind …
Before the pandemic, getting to school each morning felt like a neverending slog. I’d trudge my heavy backpack from the 1 Train at the City College …
There is a breed of champion racehorses, which in order to win, bite their own necks to get more oxygen. I think about these horses a lot. Once, in an easier time, I pretended to browse a sushi menu with great intensity. I don’t even like fish. Across from me was my date, and next to me was my best friend sitting in front of her date, who was sitting next to his friend who was sitting across from his date. It turned out the third couple didn’t like fish either — they each ate a bowl of white rice. By the end of the night, their bill was two dollars.
