Random Post 2

Is it COVID or not? You wake up on a Friday morning, and you have a slight tickle in your throat that won’t seem to go away. You were supposed to go to class at 11, get lunch with a friend at noon, more class at 2, a club meeting at 7, and a party that night. But should you just cancel all of that now? Your sore throat might just be another sore throat, but remember your friend’s birthday get-together you were at two nights ago where no one was masked? What if it’s COVID? And now you run a very real risk of spreading it to others if you go to your scheduled events of the day. And if you spread it, you’ll be known as “that person that gave me COVID” to a number of people. And no one wants to be that. So you cancel your plans, avoid going to the party, and stay home the entire day, desperately hoping it’s not COVID, but you can’t tell for sure until you lie to TrojanCheck about your symptoms and get tested the next day. All to find out, you are COVID negative and the whole thing was a scam. As I am writing this, I am sick with a stuffy nose and a slight cough. But I was tested yesterday, and as it turns out, I do not have COVID. It’s just the flu or a cold or whatever those things are called. Thank god. This isn’t the first time I have been sick without COVID during the era of COVID, but each time it’s the exact same anxiety. Are my symptoms COVID? What if I spread it to my roommates? So I self-quarantine anxiously for a little bit until I can get my test results back. This kind of anxiety is so real, especially when something else depends on your negative COVID test. I’ve had friends travel overseas only to have some symptoms while abroad, nervous that they may not be able to return home on schedule and unexpectedly stay in a foreign country for an extended period of time. I had a fever while traveling in France, losing my mind thinking that I got COVID and wouldn’t be able to return home, only to take an antigen test and find that I do not, in fact, have COVID and am still safe to travel. It’s all a bit ridiculous. On the bright side, this era has made it much more acceptable to use sickness as a valid reason to get out of something. I remember catching colds while I was a kid in middle and high school, but I would tough it out anyway even if I was really sick for fear of missing school, even if the healthy thing was to simply stay home and recover. Because of this new era and situation, I feel much more at ease doing so, and taking it easier when I don’t feel well. Sure, I may be missing out slightly, but when I have no other options, it helps me relax and take things easy, knowing that no one will expect me to show up to an event if I am showing symptoms. So overall, I think it’s interesting how the era of COVID makes us reconsider even regular colds, flu, and sickness. In some ways, it’s better, but in some ways, it’s a lot worse.