Lockdown Anecdotes: My COVID Experience

By Tyler Dehoff

To say Covid-19 was the one of the most trying times in our lives would be the understatement of the 21st century. It has impacted us all, directly or indirectly. Whether it be us contracting the disease, someone we know getting it, or someone we know succumbing to it, they are all direct consequences of this pandemic. And then there are those of us who haven’t had to face Covid head on, but still have had our lives turned upside down. It brought our world to a screeching halt, and isolated us from many of the habits we’ve been ensconced in. It introduced a new way of life that wasn’t congruent with anything we’d experienced before. And as a result, this disease has stolen from us many of the things that make us human, that make us feel alive. It has taken moments from us, experiences that we will never know, alienating us from the traditions of our culture. 

When I look back at these years, I’m going to ponder what could have been. How would things be different if I was able to fully live those moments, and not be in some quasi-state of fulfillment and endurance. I look back specifically to what should have been my rites of passage in this way, how I would have fulfilled them as I should have, rather than the imitation I experienced. I think about how sometimes here and there my parents bring up something that happened at their high school prom, then take a moment to realize I can’t share that moment with them. My generation didn’t get a prom, or a lot of experiences that would come at the end of one's childhood. We weren’t allowed to partake in many of the things that upperclassmen high school students have done in years past. In a way, my entire high school experience has become clouded by the nearly two years we spent in lockdown, communicating through screens, and locked down in our homes. In my mind, the early years of high school, before Covid, are very much a pure and blissful image. Then, when I think of the last two years with Covid, it muddies my memory of that time in my life. It’s as if I envision it in my mind as a light, lush blue on a paint palette. Fun, harmonious, blooming. Then, the time period defined by Covid seeps through. It acts as a dark brown paste that bleeds onto that palette, and muddies the pure color that was the expectation of that time of my life. Now with my palette clouded, the paint transfers to the proverbial canvas – this how I remember that period of my life. 

Now when I look back at this ‘painting’ of my high school life, that's what I see first. I know that lush blue is somewhere in all of that dark paste, but it doesn't show itself to me. I have to find it. Now, the first things I remember won’t be all the friends I made, all the long fun nights out, or the football games I played in. It won’t be the goofing off in class, the insane conversations at the lunch tables, or the walks between classes. It will be the thought of what could have been. It will be the thought of another zoom session, melding into another, or the sports season I worked so hard to prepare for to be postponed. A sense of regret that is timestamped to that period, a sense of regret that is nobody’s wrongdoing or by no means intentional. It is merely just a symptom of the times. I wonder what bonds I could have furthered that were cut short, or maturing I could have done as a product of being with my peers, or the moments I could look back on and laugh about with people I never got to meet.

I catch myself thinking about that aspect of my life every now and then. I remind myself that it isn't beneficial to think like that, and in some way, maybe it’s best I ended up on this path. In that sense, I try not to wish there was a different outcome. That period in my life made me a lot more comfortable being by myself, and learning how to truly be independent. I’m often able to find myself at peace with this pattern of thought, despite a few outliers. One of them being the passing of my grandfather at the height of the pandemic. If anything highlights the isolation of Covid to me, this would be it. As a family, we weren’t able to see him before his passing together, as we should have. Each part of our family would visit him separately, unable to come inside his home out of fear of spreading the virus. Oftentimes we would stand outside in the backyard while he and my grandmother stayed inside, trying to have quality time with each other in this way. We were never able to get within 7 feet of one another. It was no proper way to say goodbye. The day he passed I still remember vividly. We got the news in the morning, and my family and I went over to my grandparent’s' home. When I got there, I was met by the rest of my family, all together for the first time during the pandemic. It was surreal. We couldn’t grieve together the way we should have. How could we? We couldn’t hug each other, we had to remain physically apart, and our faces were hidden beneath masks. Nothing was normal about this. In that moment though, I had a profound appreciation for the time I had with my family there. That day in the rain, we grew closer to one another through the distance. 

It changed my perspective on how to view family. I think it’s a product of realizing that your family just isn't your family, they are full people of their own, with their own complex lives that sometimes you might not realize because you’ve always associated them as just your uncle or your aunt. It’s the more grandiose version of hearing your grandmother swear for the first time, or realizing that your dad just isn’t your dad, he was a young man (just like you) who then fell in love and decided to have kids. So while I stood there outside of my grandmother’s home, I looked at the faces of my aunts and uncles, my cousins and grandmother, and held a new type of kinship with them. Here we are, all together, despite the horrible circumstances. The patriarch of our family just died, we are in the height of covid, it is hurling rain outside, yet here we are. We are here for the care we all had for our grandfather, the care we have for our grandmother to help her through one of the hardest times of her life, and we are all there for each other. It was at that moment that I truly appreciated that we aren’t just family because of how we are related to each other, we are family because of what we will do for one another.

Looking back, Covid caused a great deal of pain and struggle. It brought forward a lot of fears that I had and did not want to see realized. It was a trial of hardships and in some strange way, I'm grateful for it. I’ve heard a quote somewhere that pain is the best teacher, and it won't go away until you’re done learning from it. I see this mirrored in my life in the ways that Covid affected me. I was afraid of being by myself too much, not being able to connect with others, missing out on experiences that others in different years have had. Now, with Covid starting to pass, I find myself left with the lessons and wisdom it taught me. I don't think I would be the same person I am today if Covid never came to be. Who knows, I might’ve ended up as that same naive kid that wasn’t bothered by Covid because he thought it was a two-week vacation from school. Sometimes the harshness of experiences make you the most grateful version of yourself that you can be, and it’s important not to lose sight of that. I was able to learn to not take for granted the daily events that fill up your day. Focus on the small things. In that way I was able to relish in the day to day, and find meaning in the things that I do. In a time that took away so many people’s sense of purpose in life – losing jobs, time with friends and family, hobbies – it  was important to find new ways to make life meaningful. 

For me, this was being with my close friends whenever I could and delving into my hobbies that I could still enjoy. I took time to make sure I was staying active and healthy, something I felt was paramount given how dangerous Covid can be for those in poor health. I rediscovered my love for playing music, and took up playing the drums. With so much time on my hands now, I was able to commit to these activities. Playing music became another way I was able to get closer and spend more time with my friends during the pandemic. Living day to day like this, focusing on how I was going to improve on something that day, whether it be about my health, playing music, or my mind, I found my purpose. Covid left no stone unturned in this way. It showed me new ways to find purpose in my life that before I may have never fully noticed. It brought to light these ideas that sometimes we lose sight of. For that I can say, I'm proud of how I’ve dealt with the last two years of this disease, and I’m not quite ready to say it was for the better, but life sure does bring on new meaning when faced with the life that was is Covid.