reflections on the past year

 After winding my way through a sea of crowd-control belts, directed by guides wearing yellow mesh vests, I finally made it to the parking lot. I held my coat closed against the cold with one hand, while the other gripped the gray cardstock I had just received. I got in my car, took off my mask, and looked down at the card. Reading the words “Covid-19 Vaccination Record” with my name handwritten underneath, my eyes filled with tears. 

I was crying partly because I was so grateful to be able to receive a vaccine, but mostly I was struck with an overwhelming sense of loss. Getting my vaccination felt like the beginning of the end, and with that end in sight, it is natural to look back at how far we have come. For the last year, my life—like all of our lives—was completely changed, and I still find myself mourning all that we have lost.  

 Of course, if you are one of the many Americans who has lost a loved one to Covid, this grief is profound. But for each of us, the loss is deep in a unique way. For me, it's the small losses that are the most painful. Hugging my students, walking across campus and running into friends, eating dinner with my extended family, giving my best friend her birthday gift in person—all of these seem minimal compared to the global scale of deaths, but that does not make their absence any less painful. 

Every one of us could come up with an almost endless list of these losses due to the pandemic. Particularly for students, as the high school and college years are such a temporary time of life, missing a whole year is significant. And I think we should acknowledge the impacts of our losses and give ourselves permission to mourn even the seemingly insignificant ones. Too often, I tend to minimize my feelings, arguing that others have it worse, and of course this may be true. But mourning can exist on many levels, and we all have experienced collective trauma in some sense due to the pandemic. I am a big believer in practicing gratitude and positive thinking, but in my eyes, it is equally important to allow ourselves to confront the weight of our losses as well. It is only by acknowledging loss that we can begin to heal through our grief.  

Recently, I have felt more optimistic about the future than I have in months. Vaccines are going out, cases are going down, promises of a normal Fourth of July lie just ahead of us. But at the same time, this grief persists. And I think that is okay. Even with hope of better days ahead, it is important to still give ourselves grace and mourn our losses.  

GAP year 2

 

 

 

Consider Taking a Co-op Gap Semester, Part 2

In part 1, I touched on the professional benefits of co-ops, but there are also mental health benefits from taking time off from school. My mental health, like that of many others, plummeted horribly when Covid-19 first started. Zoom classes made it even worse in Fall 2020. I constantly fantasized about dropping out of college, and more realistically considered dropping one of my majors and my honors program, even though in normal times I enjoyed both.

Pre-pandemic, I was devoting around 60 hours per week to academics. I suspect many other high-achieving students with hard majors and heavy course loads also are putting in these types of miserable hours and neglecting exercise, socializing, hobbies, and sleep. In contrast, my co-op has set 40-hour work weeks that allow me to do whatever I please with my early mornings, evenings, and weekends, so I don’t feel the constant black cloud of stress looming over me. This change has drastically improved my mental health, given me time to bond with friends, and allowed me to pursue creative interests I didn’t have the time or mental energy for when I had classes.

While online school accelerated my burnout, it had actually already begun after my Fall 2019 semester. Many of the most difficult classes for both of my majors happened in Fall 2019, Spring 2020, and Fall 2020, and some of them were classes that didn’t interest me at all but were required for graduation. I’m hoping that by taking off school for eight months, the longest I’ve been away since I was five years old, I can rekindle my love for learning. I’ve stopped fantasizing about dropping out of college and decided to stick with my double major and honors program after all, which to me is progress. Even without the problem of Zoom classes, I probably would have still felt burned out and disillusioned with my majors and possible career paths.

I think many people are also unwilling to admit they’re just not ready to narrow down what they want to do at age 18, but parents, peer pressure, and sometimes scholarship requirements force them to. My top career choice right now is one I didn’t even know existed until three semesters into college. I don’t necessarily regret my major choices, but I would have definitely made some different decisions had I known earlier so that I wouldn’t have had to teach myself so many skills now. Additionally, I think many students have self-doubt and push themselves away from possible interests, especially STEM, because they think they aren’t intelligent enough. I wonder if some more time to build self-confidence would have changed their paths.

I should include some caveats: There are some financial limitations that can make a gap semester more difficult, including loan payments that may kick in if you aren’t a full-time student, strict scholarship requirements, and that in many fields it is extremely difficult to get a paid internship, especially if you haven’t hit junior year yet. These limitations might prevent some people from taking a gap semester. However, for anyone who can, I strongly urge you to take one or at least consider it.