(Photo courtesy of August Thigpen)
I was so excited when things finally started reopening. But when someone near me tested positive for COVID, I was immediately launched back into reality.
Recently, my social media has been flooded with stories of the country reopening. On Instagram I see pictures of my friends eating indoors at restaurants, hanging out at each others’ houses, and traveling on vacation.
But just a week and a half after I got my second vaccine shot, I got an email. Someone on my badminton team tested positive for COVID-19. And none of us were allowed out of our houses for two weeks.
Once our isolation period passed, the rest of my team and I tested negative and got to return. But during that time holed up in my room, it hit me that I was right back in the same position I was in all year: under quarantine.
This was my reminder that the pandemic still isn’t over yet. And we may have a long way to go before things return to normal.