I’m 21 and Filing for Unemployment, Not Job Applications
During the past few weeks as the pandemic moving closer to the U.S. became a reality, I was constantly having conversations with fellow co-workers about the potential impact it would have if it ever reached us. At first a majority of us weren’t overly concerned about it, then we started to notice that social media users were posting photos and videos of grocery store shelves being completely cleared of typical household and basic pantry items. It wasn’t until I went to Target to buy trash bags in the middle of the week that I realized the photos on the internet weren’t fake and it was time to get prepared.
The week before spring break, my day to day life was normal as I knew it: attend class three days a week, go to work, serve on duty as a resident advisor and survive the long nights of studying just as I always did. Little did I know my life was about to completely flip upside down.
Like most students and faculty at California State University, Northridge, I was aware of the coronavirus and its impact on countries like Italy and China, but we would soon find out how suddenly it would plague our country.
Over the past two weeks, the coronavirus has changed the way we operate in our everyday lives. CSUN announced all classes for the rest of the semester will be conducted online, a majority of the residents I tend to as a resident advisor have moved out and I was laid off from my job as a student assistant on campus. I would soon join fellow student co-workers in a struggle to grasp such an unexpected change and sudden loss of income that was relied on. Within the past week, I have joined the 6.6 million other Americans who have applied for unemployment benefits due to COVID-19 causing their jobs to close or shut down, leaving them with nowhere else to turn.
As the campus began announcing the closure of certain facilities and encouraged employees to work remotely, as a front desk assistant I knew there was no work I could complete remotely and the chance of losing my job was higher. The next thing I knew, I was filing for unemployment. Although in many situations filing for unemployment may be a last resort, at a time when jobs aren’t hiring and businesses are barely able to stay open, it becomes your only option to make ends meet.
A major challenge I have faced with the coronavirus is accepting the unknown and adjusting my life to what it is becoming now. I went from having a very structured lifestyle and daily plan to having absolutely nothing to do and nowhere to go. In a way, I feel as though this is the reset I needed, but then reality kicks in and I remember that I am no longer working and still have expenses that need to be paid. I, like anyone else, have absolutely no idea how long we will be living in this way. From news reports, some reporters say just two weeks and others say this will last months and maybe a year before are allowed to go back to life as it was before.
While I still have been commuting back and forth from my house to my dorm, if I was forced to move back to my house, school would be very difficult. Now that all schools have implemented an online virtual learning system, my two younger sisters are both at home engaging in classes, and my mother, who is a middle school teacher, is teaching classes virtually. With everyone having classes that happen at the same time and not everyone having a quiet place to focus, being at home would be very hard. Being around my sisters who are 14 and 17 years old and at different levels of their educational career, I see first hand how COVID-19 has impacted them and my mom. One of my sisters, who is a graduating high school senior, now has to question the possibility of important events she spent her entire high school career looking forward to, like grad night, prom and graduation. She also has to question what her first year of college experience may look like depending on the longevity of the virus impacting our society.
One thing that has been alarming throughout this entire process is that younger people have died from the virus although it was said it would impact older people with existing health issues. Although I am younger, the virus has a tremendous effect on me, as someone who has asthma, any sort of illness that infects my respiratory system is always worrisome to me because I know the impact just a cold can have on my lungs.
Another fear that I’ve had is carrying the virus without even knowing it. I have no reason to believe that I have the virus, but between interacting with people at work to interacting with people at stores, there is no way for me to know if I’ve picked up the virus from somewhere and am spreading it to others. My main concern with contracting the virus and not knowing it is giving it to family members. My dad is diabetic and could be very impacted by the virus as well as my grandma who is almost 90.
The coronavirus has completely shifted our society and daily operations, and although there is no telling how long we will be living in such unusual circumstances, this way of life might just become our new normal.
