Graham Lowes
MY COVID EXPERIENCE: My Covid expeirence was pretty fine. I figured the best possible thing, was to do things that you would not normally get to do. What I mean by this is you are stuck at home, so manage your time well. I was at home with my mom, dad and two sisters. We were doing so much around our house, most of the work did not get complete untill November. I was living in Peterborough, Ontario and I did not leave that area for months at a time. I think overall it was a memorable expeirence.
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OBJECT DESCRIPTION AND RELATIONSHIP TO COVID-19: : These are custom made masks for Covid. Seeing as though masks have become mandatory for the last little while, it is something to add to your style. My mom is actually the one who made these masks. She wanted something to do and saw people online making masks, and figured she should do soemthing like that. Essentially, you can make any design, as long as you have the proper fabric. The inspiration for these designs are simple. I really like basketball and I am a big Toronto Raptors fan. I thought it would be cool to make flags, so this one ended up being Portugal. The Canada one was just an inspiration from elsewhere. I have greatly enjoyed being able to have a selection of masks. For the most part, I have worn the Raptors mask the most. That one is my favourite and it was the first one made. |
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PRIMARY SOURCE DESCRIPTION: This is my vaccination receipt. I think it is important to add because of the vitality of it during this time. This will most likely be the only time throughout history in which this vaccine will be distributed. Being able to read all the information which pertains to the shot will give good context. I think what is so cool about this is that everyone who gets the vaccine will have one. It becomes an identifier of sorts and relates to you personally. For all the people who live through this, I feel as though it will become the kind of item which is an insant trigger for most. It will bring back memories of your time in lockdown during COVID-19. |
PRIMARY SOURCE: VAXXED |
| NEWSPAPER HEADLINE |
PERSONAL REACTION TO THIS HEADLINE This is a headline ran by The West Australian titled "Life's A Beach". On the cover the most prominent image is then American President Donald Trump. This is dated October 3, 2020, roughly a month before the United States election. I remember when there was news circulating about Donald Trump, along with his top health officials, claiming that the consumption of bleach can combat COVID-19. I am not even using this because it is political or there are funny jabs, but rather all the unknown. It is the unknown anytime anything comes to the publics attention. It is a funny headline because so much of the population releies on the mainstream news for their firsthand information. Here it is adressing how Trump has COVID, and discusses his sarcastic health debate. |
| VISUALIZING COVID-19 This is a graph of 15 countries. The graph represent the "COVID-19 Misery Index". The make-up of the bar graph has three colours to show scores. The blue colour is to show the disease misery inside a country. The red is for the response misery, finally the yellow is the economic impact misery. Canada places at number 11 on the graph. Norway comes in at number 1. This graph is from the MacDonald-Laurier Institute and is dated March 8, 2021. |
COVID Q&A
Describe the moment you realized how serious COVID-19 was:
For me the moment I realized COVID-19 was serious, was the night that the NHL and NBA suspended their seasons. The date to be exact, March 11, 2020. I first remember hearing about COVID-19 in early January of 2020. For the most part, few people had the disease and it was only present elswhere in the world. It was such an abstract concept, the idea of COVID-19 coming to this part of the world and affecting people. Thinking back to that time, I remember Universities putting their classes on hold and transitioning to online. For this, I only figured it to be a precoutionary measure untill think blew over. School would return in the fall is what I figured. As of right now I was wrong about many things.
What did you learn about yourself or the people you live with during COVID-19?
I can not say I learned anything new. I lived at home with my family during this. My household included my mom and dad, along with two sisters. None of us were very terrified about COVID. I saw how some other people did not ever leave their homes or had any contact becasue they were so terrified. This was not anyone who I personally knew. Everybody who I had a close relation with, including myself handled the pandemic pretty well.
Other than wearing a mask, what was the biggest change you made to your daily life? Do you think this change will remain when all lockdowns are lifted?
For me the biggest change is the uncertainty of everything. What I mean by this, is what you are allowed to do in day-to-day life. For example, not knowing what is and is not open, or whether something is open but online or curbside only. There is also what you can do on your own property. I remember with my roomates we were never sure how many people were allowed to come over to our house. Furthermore, trying to figure out what the rules are inside your own home and what the rules are outside on your yard. This definilty will change when lockdowns are lifted. Simply, this is what lockdowns are all about. It is the rules you must follow and they are always changing. Sometimes we would go forward with rules, then backwards. This always addes to the uncertainty of day-to-day life.
Have you learned any new skills during the pandemic?
I have learned somethings during the pandemic. To be fully honest, I feel as though I have not taken advantage of the free time the ways I should have. A lot of the things I have learned have been for compulsory reasons, but never the less, new skills. Around our house, my family did many home improvment projects during the pandemic. The two major things were a knew fence we had to build, and a shed. For the fence I had to develop brand new wire tying abilites. This included the use of special pliers and wood. For the shed there was more work, but less new things learned. The roofing apsect is where I learned the most. I worked with a lot of scaffolding, which was the first time in my life, and for this I was high off the ground most of the time. How to lay the roof properly is what I developed at.
How do you feel about university education in the last year?
For university, I can give the benefit of the doubt and understand it is the best under the circumstances. I have always liked online classes, but only in small quantities. Some semesters I would take a class, one time two, but to do five all online is a little overwhelming. I liked in class because there was a flow to your life and week. Everything felt more organized when you could go into class and get all the info you need from there. Now, having your entire life online can be hard at times. I think most imortantly it is the social aspect of university that is being missed. People can not do the things that they came to university in the first place hoping to do. Hopefully once everything is resolved, people will get these things back. Ultimatley, lost time is still lost time.
List one positive thing and one negative thing you'll take away from 2020:
I think the positive thing can be the appreciation of time. Considering how many of us had a great deal of free time thrust upon us, we found many silver linings with COVID-19. This included many different things for many different people. Some people learned new languages, skills, or anything which they have not had the time to do. I also had a realization, watching all the people die from COVID, I acknowledged that there is only so much time in life and you have to do the things you want. The irony to me saying this for the one posotive, also comes a similar point to the negative. Point being, that more than an entire year was taken from your life. Many things were missed out on which you may never get a second chance. I feel as though the worst impacted age groups during COVID-19 have been the 17-27 people. This is because many things you experience in this age group you will only expeirence once.
What is the best movie or TV show you've watched, or the best book you've read, in the past 18 months?
One of the things I have been greatful for is being able to watch movies I normally would not have the chance to do. This mostly included 3+ hour movies. Ben-Hur from 1959, was a movie I had never seen to this point. I always put it off due to its length being nearly 4 hours. Now with all the time inside I finally was able to. Again with all the free time, I could start new TV series. I decided to watch the Sopranos, which again, I had never seen the series. I ended up enjoying it very much.
How large of an impact do you think COVID-19 has had on your mental health?
I think it was not huge on my mental health. I felt I was able to turn all the time into something good for myself. I was able to reassure my self and get to do things I normally would not get to do. As I said earlier, I found a lot of realizations. I realized that you must be able to do the things you want to do in life. I do not mean this in an obvious way, but rather looking at all the people who were dying so soon, many because of COVID-19. Overall, this gave me a whole other perspective on life.
How has technology impacted your life during lockdown?
I ended up streaming a lot of movies and televison. So naturally it would be my laptop and television. I actually got most of my news off of my Iphone. I do not watch news on television, or read newspaper and I do not rely on the radio. I used to utilize these more often, but as time has gon on it has been less and less. I feel as though my phone has so much info on it that nowhere else is better.
How has the pandemic brought wider acknowledgement to systemic racism in Canada?
I feel like many of the news stories during the pandemic have been related to race issues. One of the biggest is how the Chinese people have been scapegoated for the disease. I think a lot of it has drawn upon history. We as a society have realized that blaming others for problems has been common throughout history, and usually it ends up being an ethnic group of people. Some people have acknowledged past wrong doings and want to learn from it.
In what ways do you envision society changing due to the pandemic?
I think there will be a massive consciousness in about sanitation and personal hygiene. This will become a public wide instance. People are going want to do whatever they can to prevent future problems. It will all begin at a personal level to prevent diseases. I also think wearing masks will become a norm. For people my generation, I nobody would be suprised in 20 years from now if you see the occasional person wearing mask.
Now that you are done with both the course and your additions to the archive, is there anything you'd like to reflect on?
I think what gets me is how people will see this who never lived through it. That is why I liked this course, is because it is all about contextualizing COVID-19. It will be able to leave a footprint for people in the future to see what people living in the years 2020, 2021 and maybe even later, were going through. This is the same way people today may look at the Great Depression, the First World War era and many more parts of history.