Okay, we were eleven months into the year and things went, well...CRAZY! At the beginning of the year, I had posted that I was looking for a new job. I was tired of working for the YMCA because it was a lot of mindless yet repetitive work. I enjoyed some of the people that I worked with and I really enjoyed the members but there wasn't a lot of challenging work to be done. With that being said, I did begin working as a tutor for 1st, 3rd & 4th graders at an elementary school. Tuesday thru Thursday, I went into those classrooms that I was assigned to and pulled students into small groups to help with English and Math. It was cool! I was able to teach them some math and English skills that they were lacking and also help them be better prepared to take the EOG (End of Grade) tests that they take at the end of the year. It was all very rewarding because I was in a role that I was helping young children be successful with test taking strategies and I was still able to see the seniors and all the other Y members as they came in for their workouts.
In addition to this, I was also gearing up and getting ready to compete in my second bodybuilding competition in April. This was happening all while this new virus, (which we now know as Covid-19 :coronavirus 19) was taking the world by storm and turning people’s lives upside down. I remember my friend/supervisor joked daily about how many more people had been affected and then the unexpected happened. The United States had it’s first case pop up in Washington State. Things were starting to take a turn. So many people in the U.S. had begun to fall prey to this unsuspecting virus all over the states, North Carolina included. In the beginning, we knew little about this virus but we did know that we needed to wear gloves, wipe things down often with disinfecting spray and wipes and mask up if possible. We had gotten an email that the schools were shutting down early for spring break in hopes that it would blow over and my kids had an extra week to be at home during this same time. Only, things NEVER blew over and the kids never went back to school in person for the remainder of the year. It was quite unfortunate because it was my daughter’s last year at the school she was attending and she never got to tell her friends goodbye. My son had just begun K-3 that January and by March he was sitting at home doing lessons online daily. Not only did they (the kids) have to finish school online, I was out of both work from both of my jobs.
EVERYTHING stopped! The entire world was on edge except for those that followed the president’s way of thinking. He told such lies about the virus not being real and that people did not need to wear protective face coverings or anything because he didn’t want people to panic. We all know in hindsight his words were damaging to say the least. Thousands of people died not believing and many people are still suffering from the affects of the virus today! All types of businesses closed because the world was on a literal lockdown! There were curfews set, gyms closed, restaurants closed, hair and nail shops closed. It was as if the end of the world was happening right before our eyes and there was nothing we could do about it.
I began watching YouTube videos and began making epoxy cups and t-shirts just to make a little money. My husband was locked out of the country because the country in which he worked shut down the airport—no travel was allowed in or out! Needless to say, I stopped preparing to compete! I happened to be on Facebook looking at jobs when one listing about contact tracing came up. I applied and within the next couple of days, I was contacted and interviewed. That was in April and in July, I was called again and was told that the county in which I lived was ready to start the contact tracing efforts! I was really excited about it and on July 31, 2020, I began my training.
It has been a year and almost a month now that I’ve been working. Earlier this year, things had slowed down considerably and the company was now downsizing and I had begun a new role as a team lead making more money than I had ever made in my working career. Since the downsizing, I have been downgraded from a team lead to a case investigator—calling positive case patients and interviewing them about their COVID illness. They have since started hiring people to come back and work with the company because another strain of the virus has mutated and is more contagious than the strain back in 2020. My son went to in-person school all of last year except for the two weeks he was out due to one of the teachers in his class who tested positive and he had to quarantine for two weeks to make sure he didn’t get sick. My daughter started her first year of high school at a new school from a computer last August and beginning in January, she went twice a week. After spring break, she went four times a week and was just fine.
They both, in addition to my nephew started school last week, in person! My daughter’s school district decided to mandate masks while in school and my son’s school just decided that all students, staff and faculty should wear a mask as well. Although it wasn’t mandated in the beginning, I sent him to school in a mask everyday anyway. Simply because I know the vaccine isn’t available for children under 12 as of yet, I would hate for my baby to get sick! I pray that none become sick but more importantly, my family members.
I was the first of my family to be vaccinated, then my mother, my eldest sister and husband and my daughter. My middle sister has the mindset that she isn’t going to get the vaccine because the science isn’t there but hopefully she’ll change her mind since her grandson, my three year old nephew is living with her. It has definitely been a wicked year and a half but I am hoping for a brighter end soon. The job I have has it’s flaws as any other job has but I’m praying that I will be able to find something else after we’ve come out of this worldwide pandemic. I am continuing to do what I can to promote the health and well-being of others but there’s only so much we can do. I too am tired of having to wear a mask everywhere I go but I continue to do it because you just never know who is sick. People who are fully vaccinated are still getting sick however they aren’t dying from it or having to go into the hospital for an extended stay. I have had family members pass away on account of Covid-19 and I know people who have been hospitalized due to Covid-19 so this thing is real!
The United States has a new president (even though some people believe the election was stolen…there was a riot at the nation’s capitol but I won’t go into that on this post 🥴) and he is doing all he can to get the word out to get people vaccinated. I believe we have a long road to recovery awaiting us but we can do it.
