J.

Covid-History Item Type Metadata

Age

35

Date

03/16/2021

Location

Jamestown

When did the impact of COVID-19 first occur to you? How did your reaction to COVID-19 change between then and the first case in your town?

I heard about it from the news and from friends who live in China in Jan and Feb, It became impactful personally, on March 13th when I offered to work from home to meet the governor's mandate of only 50% of work staff.

How is your life different now than it was before the pandemic?

Less socializing in person mostly and unable to travel and visit family in FL. Working from home for 4 months was different but in a good way. Overall the day by day was just more time at home and in nature, which wasn't all bad.

How are you feeling? What are you doing to relieve stress?

Feelings have been all over the place for a year, and often a rollercoaster each week. Thankfully I'm around a grounded community of family and friends which has helped. I crochet, and have made a lot of new projects in the last year! During the summer our rowing club had single boats to take out and the family has kayaks as well, so I spent time on the water as well.

Are you working from home? What adjustments or challenges are you experiencing?

I worked from home for 4 months and it was a nice change. No traffic, less time on the morning routine. I was kinda sad when our office went back the first week in July.

How are you using social media, the Internet, or digital platforms during the pandemic?

I started doom scrolling a lot more. COVID news, political news, all the downers. It was about Nov. that I had to step away and limit my time on all platforms due to mental exhaustion and constant anger/ sadness. I know check social media a bit but to see what things are opening up in the community and to get recommendations of a new path to hike or birds to search for.

What positive things did you contribute to or notice take place?

I reached out to friends more, both to check on them and to make sure I didn't go to a dark place. As a social person I enjoy friends, but this has really helped me go deeper with some of my friendships.

If you lost someone during the pandemic, how did you celebrate their lives?

We didn't lose them due to COVID but during lockdowns. No celebration has happened yet as we are waiting until it's safe to gather as family and friends.

What do you wish you knew before the pandemic began?

To not start doom scrolling on social media and that all the lessons taught on digital literacy meant nothing in the face of misinformation.

What would you want future generations to know about the 2020 pandemic? How would you recommend they prepare for it?

To always have a back-up plan or prepared plan somewhere in planning. Think that there's a bad weather storm in the future and stock up on necessities. More than stocking up though, to build connections with neighbors and friends now, so when the needs are great your community is there for each other.

How do you think this pandemic will change how we behave going forward? What will the “new normal” look like?

I wish it would change how we as a society view health care, food insecurity, and safety nets for our community. We have a chance to learn from the broken systems and fix them so more people are not falling through the cracks, but I fear that we won't do anything in order to get back to what convinces we had before things went crazy.

Dublin Core

Title

J.

Subject

COVID-19 (Disease)

Publisher

Southern Adirondack Library System

Date

03/16/2021

Contributor

Southern Adirondack Library System

Rights

Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-ShareAlike 4.0 International License.

Language

English

Type

Covid History

Identifier

12495887544

Coverage

Coronavirus Pandemic

Citation

“J.,” Leaving Our Fingerprints on History, accessed March 28, 2024, https://fingerprints.sals.edu/omeka/items/show/346.

Output Formats

Geolocation