Even though I haven’t picked up a new hobby like I hoped I would in the beginning of all of this, I have learned some important things. They’re not big, life-changing things, but they’ve made quarantine life bearable.
1. The shade is so important.
I don’t know if you knew. Shade is everything. I hadn’t realized how essential shade is to my life until I started walking with my boyfriend. I’m not usually a walker. Sure, I enjoy a casual stroll in the park every week or so. But, we’ve been walking at least six—yes, six—miles everyday. With gyms being closed and my boyfriend having geriatric knees, walking is our only source of exercise. And in the heat of summer, you cherish those brief moments of respite. You yearn for the shade. You seek it out. And when there isn’t any around? Well, you can assume that I’m having a terrible day.
2. I don’t hate zoom school.
Perhaps this is controversial. But, zoom isn’t entirely awful.
It was difficult transitioning in-person classes to online ones in the middle of the semester. (Which is what my college, like many others, had to do.) The context is entirely different. Whereas before, I would sit facing the whiteboard, with most of my classmates being formless voices. Suddenly, I was confronted with faces. Who are these people who pop up on my screen when they make the slightest sound? I missed the anonymity of sitting in my wooden chair, unable and unwilling to turn around. It just wasn’t the same.
But, things are a bit different right now. I’m currently taking a remote bootcamp for user experience that has been on zoom since day one. I know my classmates only as zoom people. I know which of them tends to forget to mute themself and which of them so poorly frames their face. I know what to expect from each of them. For, zoom is where these people live. And, I feel comfortable with them.
And perhaps, the instructors are more experienced teaching online.
3. I love pancakes.
I was never a big pancake person. I would claim to be a waffle person. It’s far more unlikely that you’ll come across a piping hot waffle iron ready to make the whole group a batch of fresh waffles. So, when are we really going to be eating waffles? Realistically, not very often.
But things have changed.
Before, when I ate pancakes, I paired its insipidness with some nice jam. I’m not a huge fan of that sticky, sickly sweet syrup that everyone smothers their pancakes with. I saw through this pancake charade. They liked pancakes simply as a vehicle for the syrup.
But one day, my boyfriend picked up a pancake mix that changed my mind. (I believe it’s something along the lines of “Birch Wood Pancakes.” I know it when I see it.) I don’t know what they are doing in their manufacturing facility, but it worked on me. And now I’ve become like the rest of you. I am a pancake person. These Birchy Woody Pancakes were my gateway drug, for now, I can be quite undiscerning about the type of pancake.
And, I love it.
I hope to grow more during quarantine. In fact, I’m sure I will. But, for now, I am satisfied with what I have learned.
