It feels like it was just yesterday when the beginning of lockdown started, but it was actually exactly one year ago. A lot of incidents have happened since then, making 2020-2021 the two most dramatic years. Happy Covid-versary!

March 13th, 2020: the beginning of the end… of all after school activities. We were all sitting in our classrooms without masks like any other normal day, when suddenly the announcements came on, informing us all that there were no more sports or our other favorite activities. It was a bummer, but two days later was a break from school (at least for a month.)

During our long spring break, things were getting weird. Products like toilet paper and hand sanitizer were out of stock all over the nation. Not only were stores shelves empty, but so were the sidewalks and buildings, as everyone was at home trying to relax and adapt to this new “temporary” lifestyle. But as things were getting boring, the internet was there to save the day. Memorable TikTok dance trends, whipped coffee, the “Tiger King” craze, baking bread, and of course, Zoom.

At the very start of the new month, April was when Fargo North High began their first day of virtual school to end the messy semester. To make things messier, there were glitches, blocked websites, and other technical difficulties that made homeschooling a lot more difficult. Some students enjoyed the student-centered approach, whereas some did not appreciate being on camera. Online schooling may not have been entirely smooth, but people were eager for summer to come, only until we realized lockdown was still in session and things still weren’t back to normal.

The end of school was a bit happier for most, finally school was almost done and we were closer to freedom to relax, until the uproar of protests were happening, marking a very important day in history. George Floyd’s death occurred during the 3rd month of lockdown, resulting in countless people around the world to side with the Black Lives Matter movement, a movement that protests against police brutality and violence against black people. This movement became something that politically divided people even more, which over the summer led to two precise sides for the political candidates.

Summer was coming to an end, and school had planned to have a “hybrid” school year for at least the first semester. The main focus of fall was that it was time to vote. It was basically a race between President Joe Biden and Donald Trump, and it was a close tie too. Even people outside the U.S. were feeling anxious about this presidential election until the president of the United States was revealed, and Biden won. This struck more protesting, only it was politically-driven. Conspiracies about whether the votes towards Biden were rigged became popular all over the internet, including in polls like “Half of Republicans say Biden won because of a ‘rigged’ election” by Reuters. The poll ended up concluding that the majority of people who said the election was rigged were in fact Republicans. And when things were already crazy, things got even crazier when a (literally) deadly riot broke out at the capitol, with Republicans storming the capitol after being instructed by Trump
to do so, while resulting in five deaths. The 2020 election will go down in history.

During the rest of winter, things seemed to be more calm, and school was back to 5-day weeks. Although we are still masked up and socially distanced, there are still many things that completely changed from the first lockdown to now, one year later. Despite a whole year of stress, there are some positives that have come out of 2020-2021. Some people have found their true style, people have been more educated about the BLM movement and racism in general, people are finally getting Covid-19 vaccines, and society has overall tried their best to work together through these tough times. Happy Anniversary, Covid!