Tessa Covello
Special to The Leader
On Wednesday, March 11, Fredonia sent out an email around 5 p.m.
The email said students were to leave campus by March 19, no exceptions, because of the coronavirus.
I freaked out because I was planning to leave for break the next day at 5 p.m.
Now, I had to be moved out within 24 hours.
After seven different phone calls with my parents, we figured out how I was getting home and tried to summarize three different emails from the school.
On Thursday at 5 p.m., I got home and started packing for break because our trip, at the time, was still on.
Our plan was to travel to Park City, Utah, and stay there for five days to ski and explore.
After a seven hour travel day, we met up with my sister in Utah and went to the AirBnb we booked.
Everything was normal.
Day One: We went skiing and went out for dinner, but on our way to dinner it was very noticeable that people were staying inside, avoiding restaurants … things weren’t normal.
That night, we received an email that said the ski resort was closing due to the virus, meaning the whole reason we booked this trip was no longer happening.
As this was happening, my sister Lucy, who studies at University of Michigan, sent us an email that said they were closing the university and she planned on coming home.
My other sister, Maggie, works in San Francisco.
She received an email saying she would have to work remotely, and my mom wanted her at home.
Within three days, my parents went from no children at home to all three.
Both Maggie and I were in tears.
The next day, now our last day, we decided to go to the city and go on a scenic tour by car. It was great, except we had very limited options as to where we could go. After our long day of driving, we received another email from the place we were staying that all restaurants in Park City would be closing due to the virus.
It was as if every email we received was a sign that we should leave.
The next day, during the 10 hour travel day to get home, Maggie got another email saying if she had decided to stay in San Francisco, she would have been forced to stay in her apartment for at least three weeks.
With every new email we got, the virus/pandemic was becoming a little more real and scary.
We are now in Day four of quarantine, and the rules according to my parents are: I cannot leave to hang out with friends, and if they come over, they must be six feet away from me and outside.
Basically, I’m stuck in the house.
It’s funny, when you’re a homebody you’d think this would be great.
However, when the only thing you can really do is watch Netflix or YouTube, you find yourself not wanting to anymore.
I’m just hoping this doesn’t last long.