55 “Hooray, more March Break!” – My COVID-19 Reflections

The COVID-19 Pandemic began when I was in the ninth grade, right before March Break. I went to Westdale Secondary School here in Hamilton, and I clearly remember sitting in geography class, when our teacher told us to expect an extended break. In hindsight, I don’t think even she knew quite how long it would be. At the time, I was so excited to have an extra week off and was planning all the things that I would do. Little did I know it would be the last time I would see a lot of my classmates until two years later in the eleventh grade.

We followed the lockdown procedures very seriously at first. My dad handled all of the grocery shopping, and when he returned home, we would meticulously disinfect every item before bringing it inside and putting it away. The routine became quickly familiar, wiping down food containers, washing our hands repeatedly, and being hyper-aware of all the invisible germs.   

For me, the biggest challenge during COVID was the disruption to my own personal routine. Like many, I appreciate a good schedule that I can stick with, even if it makes me a little boring. But during the pandemic, with all the family stuck together in an apartment, there was always something chaotic going on. I love my family, and I am so grateful to have had so many privileges, but sometimes I was driven to the brink of insanity. It was very easy to lose focus, and even easier for me to lose my temper. Nonetheless, I did end up getting to spend so much time with my loved ones, and that was something beautiful that came out of such a stressful time. I have memories with my siblings and conversations with my parents that I’ll cherish forever. 

In the beginning of the pandemic, particularly the end of 2020, I spent lots of time outside! I loved waking up really early, and being in the park that I grew up in all my life filled with the sounds of children shrieking in laughter and sizzling barbeques, now entirely silent and eerily calm. It was jarring at first, but I grew to really appreciate the bit of quiet time that I’d get riding my bike by abandoned parks and shooting a basketball by myself or with my brother for hours. I missed being outside with my friends, but we found other ways to see each other, like facetimes and nightly discords while doing homework. It wasn’t perfect, but if anything we got closer as we had to get more creative to spend time together. There were moments, like when fasting during Ramadan and not being able to go to the Mosque for night prayer, where I would feel the hole of an in-person community more deeply, and online zoom meetings wouldn’t be enough.

I remember a lot of fear early into the pandemic, there were so many questions that people had and so many sources of information they were utilising to any of them. One example that I can clearly remember was when my mom was on the phone discussing something a family member had sent over Whatsapp (of course it was Whatsapp). My mother, who is an incredibly intelligent and educated health care worker, was having difficulty deciphering misleading posts and forwarded links, because nobody knew what or who to trust. It was ironic that COVID-19 caused wide-spread panic that manifested in hoarding of toilet paper but was treated almost trivially when the conversation of masks and vaccinations came up, immediately losing it’s “potency” due to mistrust of scientific solutions.   

A lot of my family in the US were suspicious about the impacts of the vaccine, whether in part due to them being part of a historically marginalized group when it came to healthcare, or general mistrust of the government. They had made the decision to not get vaccinated, and it was something I remember listening to my parents argue in great detail with them deep into the night. Around March of 2021, my aunt ended up contracting COVID-19 while pregnant, and although she wasn’t necessarily a part of any high-risk group and was in perfect health, she ended up getting incredibly sick. She ended up in the hospital almost three days after testing positive, and spent almost two weeks on a ventilator. We would call every day to ask how she was doing, and the entire family was so incredibly distraught. My aunt is the sweetest, and seeing her reduced to rasping breaths while hooked up to a terrible looking machine in a sterile hospital room was difficult for anyone to bear. Eventually, she did recover, although there were scares when we thought she wouldn’t make it. After that ordeal, all of my relatives in the US ended up getting vaccinated, even if at first they didn’t agree. It was something that sparked caution in us back home in Canada as well, even though we were already more conservative in our quarantining protocols. We paid closer attention to the news, steered clear of busy areas and tried our best to be even more vigilant.

My younger sister, who is a type I diabetic, is considered part of the “high-risk” population for the virus, and I remember feeling worried that I would bring it home to her once schools opened in a hybrid format during the 2020-2021 school year, especially after what happened to my aunt. However, I also realised how much I missed being in school, and how much I missed being around others. It was absolutely nothing like “normal”, but I could appreciate that at the time it was the closest we could get. Now, when I look back on my sixteen-year-old self, I wish I could tell her that “normal” would be sooner than she realised, and that her next few years in high-school and beyond would herald some of the most incredible experiences in her life, where she would meet some amazing people. The pandemic was a lot of things; it was terrifying of course, but also a means to learn so much more about myself and to grow as a sister, a daughter and a friend. It changed the way I looked at the world, and now I can reflect on how I had the opportunity to live through a major historical event that will be studied like the ones I’ve studied before it.