Peoples' Perspectives: COVID-19 In Whatcom County

11/10/2020

Dear History,

Throughout the pandemic some things I've noticed in myself is that my morale and happiness has been a bit down. I am someone that requires being around other people for happiness. So, when we first went into lockdown, I definitely struggled with less social interaction, but as time has gone on and more has opened up, I’ve been doing a lot better. But I'm still having some struggles with school being online and having to do all my work on a computer, in meetings without getting to see and talk to people much. Within my family I've noticed that they are definitely more cautious as they should be. My family has tried to still keep my sister and I occupied, but doing it in a safe environment. For example, hanging out with friends like going on walks but social distanced and with masks on. For me, I play soccer, and throughout the summer we couldn't do team practices, but to make sure I could still play, my dad decided that if we wore masks the entire time, we could still play. With my friends I haven’t noticed much difference at all. Most of them loosely follow social distancing, but don't wear masks unless completely necessary. I find this to be a bad thing because with kids grouping up, it allows the virus to spread more easily. Switching up gears a bit, I think the government needs to do a lot more to ensure that the virus stops spreading so much. As sad and boring as it is, I think the government needs to put us into a lockdown, but like a proper lockdown, where almost everything is closed, and people aren’t allowed to see each other. As terrible as it seems, it looks to be the only way that we can get past this. As seen in Europe, full lockdowns very much prevent the spreading of the virus. Although currently it is rising again, they are in a second wave of it, while the US has been in the first wave for 5/6 months.