So, I've finished my first full week of online schooling and I'm on the first day of my second. There are a few things I've noticed about life during the COVID-19 quarantine, and since I've discovered that I'm a person who likes lists, I've wrote one.
Why so much homework? Holy cow, I have a lot to do nowadays. I'm usually a very disorganized and scattered person, but I've gotten to a point where I have no choice but to use a planner, which hasn't happened in years. I usually swear by the method of trusting myself to remember everything, but that isn't an option anymore. I'm actually kind of glad that this is the case. I've noticed that my life is a lot easier without having to worry about what I'm forgetting. I've also gotten into a habit of doing my work as soon as I get it, which is why I have most of my assignments for the week done by Monday night. It's been a relief to be able to be productive.
My day feels different. My poor body must be so confused at what's been going on in the past month or so. I was used to waking up at 7:30 to go to school, but it was an exhausting routine because I tend to go to bed late because of homework and practice. After school closings were declared, I took full advantage of the time I now had to sleep in. For two weeks, I woke up around noon and noodled around until midnight. I expected myself to get things done every day, but I always ended up disappointing myself. After school started again, I started getting into the rhythm of productivity again. Having my classes done before 1 pm with no extracurriculars to worry about finally gave me enough time to do homework and play violin and write my novel. During the regular school year, I had to pick one. It feels really good to be able to do everything I love in one day, and it feels really different.
My social life is flourishing? This is something I didn't expect. When quarantine was announced, I thought it would plunge me into a long, long period of being lonely. But everyone else in my life is lonely as well, which makes it really easy to reach out to people and develop new friendships. My relationships have also been improving with people I'm already friends with. I've also been combining my friend groups and introducing the people I know to each other. Maintaining my social life is something really important to me that I often fail at because of my ambition and mental health issues, but for the first time in my life, I feel like I can have it all.
I need to leave my room more often. Even though my creative, social, and academic life are doing better, my physical life isn't. I've turned my room into a micro-ecosystem. I wake up in my bed, I hang out at my dresser until school is over, I do my homework at my desk, I practice violin in the bathroom so I have access to a mirror, and then I return to my bed to hang out with my friends or write my novel. I'm never more than a few steps away from my room, and I haven't been getting a lot of exercise. I'll bet my body is going to start punishing me for that soon, and for my unhealthy snacking habits. It feels like being stuck in the house because of the whether, but I've restricted myself to just my bedroom.
I'm very dependent on my devices. My friend and I were checking the screen time functions on our iPhones the other day, and I found some information that unsettled me a bit. Out of 168 hours last week, I spent about 107 on my phone. I had a daily average of 15 hours of screen time per day last week. I spent 30 hours alone on the messages app. I don't have the same analytics on my Macbook, but I suspect the numbers look about the same because I tend to multitask on devices. I have no idea how I've gotten this addicted to technology. I'm to the point that I barely notice that I'm on my phone. It's very bad for my ADHD, because I'm aware that I need to remove stimulus and distractions in order to focus on school, music, and writing--but I just tell myself to push through with multitasking and mindless entertainment. I don't think technology is bad, but I think it's very bad for my attention span.
In conclusion, life is very different than what I'm used to. I've gotten more organized and more productive, which is something I didn't expect of myself. I've also been strengthening my connection with other people. This self-improvement has come with the drawbacks of worsening my physical health and my dependency on distractions. I'm very glad that I'm organized with schoolwork, though. I would trade all the benefits of quarantine for just that. I hope I keep the schoolwork habits I've developed over quarantine long after it's over.