Coronavirus | From the Eyes of a College Student

   
  This wasn't how I expected my freshman year of college to go.

      Last Sunday, March 8th, I was sitting in a meeting preparing for my Spring Break trip to Georgia. Life was exciting. I was surrounded by a great community and was eagerly looking forward to the upcoming weeks.

Monday
      Monday was a Monday. Long, but nothing out of the ordinary. My Chem professor warned us in lab that if we went on Spring Break trips we'd come back with coronavirus. He had been doing that for weeks. So, honestly, I didn't think much of it.

Tuesday
      That's where things started to get weird. People started talking about Covid-19 a lot more than they had before. I mean, yeah, it had been in the news, but a noticeable buzz was starting...

Wednesday
      My day was jam-packed with working, classes, and attending training for work. By the time I dragged myself to Bible study that night, I was mentally and physically exhausted. That afternoon, the campus had received an e-mail from the Chancellor saying there was a potential that classes would be cancelled due to Covid-19. I honestly didn't see it coming. That night it was nearly impossible to have a conversation that went 10 minutes without mentioning Corona.

Thursday
      As I walked through the hallways to lecture, I heard the same snippets of conversation wherever I went. "Corona...Covid-19.... classes cancelled?"
     I walked into my math class and immediately sensed that something was different. My side of the room barely ever talks to each other. All of a sudden, new people were on my side of the room and everyone was talking (that says something). A rumour was circling that an e-mail would be released at 11:30 announcing the university's decision about classes. Of course, the class was scheduled to start at the same time.

      11:30am
      Class started. No e-mail. The minutes slowly rolled by. No one's really paying attention to the lesson.

     11:51 am. 
     Suddenly, the e-mail comes in. I quickly skim it over as the shock sets in. As of the next day (Friday) students were being strongly encouraged to leave the dorms and return home. The last week of classes before Spring Break was cancelled. Following Spring Break, we wouldn't be returning to campus, but would instead continue classes using a virtual format. At that moment, any hope of my fellow classmates and I getting anything out of the next hour of the lecture was lost. No one could focus on anything but the fact that all of a sudden, we were headed home for the next month.

     After class, I met up with a good friend to try and work through this mess. I was confused and uncertain. With my job on campus, I wasn't even sure if I could (or should) go home.
   
     Later that afternoon, I went to work. Normally, I would be setting up conference rooms for student-org meetings and events. But they had all been cancelled.

Friday
     I finally decided that going home was my best option. It wasn't what I wanted. At the beginning of the week, I was preparing for a spring break trip. Now, I was suddenly trying to determine how much of my dorm I should empty considering I might never come back to class this semester. At the same time, I'm wondering if returning home is even a good idea. Out of all my family members, I'm the most likely to unknowingly be carrying the same virus that started this whole mess in the first place. I didn't feel good about either of my choices. But after a lot of praying and advice-seeking, I did feel that home was where I was supposed to be. So I started packing.

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     Now, three days later, my news feed is still filled with people either panicking about Covid-19 or saying we're all overreacting about a mild respiratory condition. I don't even know if it's worth worrying about what I'm worried about. But what I do know is I'm confused, I'm concerned, and that there are parts of the world that are a lot worse off than we are right now. I don't like this situation. Period. But for some reason, it's part of God's plan. Do I understand why? Not in the least. Do I understand that he has it under control? Yes.

       The past few days have taught me a lot about trusting God moment by moment. It's easy to get depressed about this. I still don't like it. But I need to continually put my trust in Him.

     I'm going to have a lot of time on my hands for the next few weeks. A lot of time to worry or a lot of time to make a difference in my and other's lives. My goal while I'm off-campus is to find something good in every day. I don't know if it's going to be a word, a phrase, or a story. But I need to keep my focus where it belongs. On the one who has this all under control.

     The purpose of the blog has always been to display the little ways that God uses events to create his masterplan. My guess is, this situation is going to be a pretty good example someday. (And, hey, someday I can show my kids what I wrote while surviving the Covid-19 pandemic!)