Danielle Ardente is a senior at WHS and a guest writer for Hi’s Eye. She wanted to tell her story, her way and Hi’s Eye has given her the space to do this. 

No one pictured our world coming to this, no one saw this coming. Our world was not prepared for a pandemic, and we certainly didn’t want one. I didn’t picture my senior year turning out like this; I didn’t picture my life turning out like this. But, sometimes bad things happen, and we have to learn how to overcome them. 

When COVID-19 started, the first person I thought of was my grandma. She had many underlying health conditions that put her at risk if she contracted COVID-19. Because I lived with my grandma, I took care of her every day and always kept her company. Unfortunately, she ended up getting COVID-19 and didn’t survive. It took her life in 14 days. 

The loss was unimaginable for my family and me. We are still grieving. We were told to quarantine for 14 days by the doctors, so we did. For two weeks I didn’t leave my house, and I had no problem with that. We were put on lockdown anyway and told not to leave our houses so the virus wouldn’t spread. My family and I are not alone in being told to quarantine if someone in our household contracted the virus. However, some people listened when being told to quarantine, and others did not.

 The ones that listened were taking the proper precautions and trying to protect others from COVID-19. The people that didn’t listen refused to admit the pandemic was a threat and thought of it as a “hoax.” 

Well, I will assure you, this is most definitely not a hoax. It is a very real thing and even if we don’t want to believe it, this is what our world has come to; this is real life. Did I ever think this was going to hit so close to home? Absolutely not, but it did and I am just one of the millions of people who have had to suffer a loss as a result of COVID-19 and can testify just how real this virus truly is. While I was excited for school to start back up in September, I wasn’t expecting to have a normal school year, and that has certainly been the case thus far. When school shut down for the first time, I wasn’t surprised at all. I knew it was probably going to happen, but I thought to myself if people just quarantined they’ll be able to open school back up in no time. When they opened school back up all was well, until more students in our school tested positive, so they had to shut down for the second time. I eventually went all virtual because I knew many people had COVID-19 in our school, and it wasn’t the safest place for me to be at the moment, so I removed myself to keep my family and me safe. 

When I made the decision to join Cohort C as an all-virtual student, a number of questions ran through my head regarding the spike in cases at WHS. How are so many people all of a sudden getting the virus? How is it spreading so fast? The one logical answer I could think of was that people must not be quarantining when told to do so. There’s no way If people were quarantining the numbers would be this high.  

It is crucial that if someone is carrying this virus, they must stay home. That is the most important rule. Staying home decreases the risk of spreading the virus and keeps more people safe.

You would think people would understand to not go out if they have COVID-19 or were exposed to someone who has COVID-19, but some people are not getting that. I understand it’s hard to be away from your family and friends at the moment, but this pandemic has killed millions of people and will continue to take the lives of people if we as a society don’t stop the spread. 

My family and I had to quarantine because my grandma got COVID-19, and quarantining wasn’t as bad as I thought it was going to be. People think it is the end of the world when you have to quarantine. Believe me, it isn’t. By not quarantining, you’re just putting the rest of society at risk and prolonging the pandemic.

 If you want to keep the virus under control, you must stay home if you feel sick or have any symptoms. We all want life to go back to normal, so we all have to follow the rules so we can keep each other safe and this virus can go away.