Living through the year 2020 was the greatest challenge I experienced. I felt stranded. I was stuck in the walls of my house during a deadly pandemic. I couldn’t see any of my friends even though they all got together when everything was so unclear.
As I write this, I worry that nobody will empathize with me. I am truly, truly afraid. But please read my words as though you were not alive during this pandemic. Pretend you are living one hundred years from now.
I was honestly afraid of dying. So many people died from this disease called the coronavirus. I thought the world was coming to an end. At the time I write this, 4.5 million people have died. 4.5 million souls have left this world. And they didn’t deserve it.
Everyone had to wait in line at stores to get simple necessities. I remember we had to ration food because of how difficult it was to get. And of course, who could forget the toilet paper shortages? It seems like a joke now when people were fighting over toilet paper in the stores, but in truth, it shows the real nature of humans. Everyone was intensely selfish in a way I didn’t understand at the time. I still don’t. It was about survival. There was no time for kindness or compassion. It seemed like the world became a different reality once the pandemic hit as though it were a sword.
I was secluded from everyone except my family. I felt like I was about to be on the verge of a mental breakdown from only having my parents and siblings for company. I wanted to run away, but of course, that wasn’t an option with the deadly pandemic on the loose. I knew so many people in the community whose lives ended from the disease. Each time I’d hear of someone else who died, everything felt more surreal.
And then, I felt utter anger and hate. Harsh as it may seem, who could blame me? I was trapped in my room, wishing to be outside with everyone else, while at the same time not wanting to since I could get sick.
I felt unheard and completely ignored by those around me. Most of them didn’t understand. Nobody felt my pain.
My mother could die if I got her sick; she was immunocompromised. I had no choice if I didn’t want to kill her. I had to be careful. How could I survive the guilt of murder?
Embarrassment could not explain the humiliation I felt each time my friends asked me to spend time with them and I had to decline their invitation.
I am so afraid of everyone dying. I don’t want to live in a world where there are no people. I would feel more alone than I did in the year of 2020.
I am losing all hope that life will be normal again. That is the most depressing thought I could conjure in my head; what if I have to live this way for the rest of my life?
What if we all perish? I wonder what it is like to not exist.