Jacob, Saginaw County

Storyteller: Connor Shoemaker

Jacob had first heard about the virus in February of 2020. He recalls seeing multiple memes about it on Instagram in China before it actually became a severe pandemic and getting to America. At first, he did not take it seriously and was excited to get a couple of weeks off of school when things began to get shut down. He was planning to go to Florida for spring break, and he was sad that those plans never actually ended up happening due to corona. 

He had a job at the Sawmill golf course as a cook, but he was laid off for a period of time because of COVID-19. His day to day, life changed dramatically due to the pandemic, and the most significant part was not being able to see his friends. He would go out almost every night after he got out of work and hang out with his friends, but eventually, he could no longer do that. While everyone else could also no longer come out of the house unless they had a job that was still open, everyone resorted to playing Xbox all day. Jacob’s problem was that he had just recently moved into a new house and was unable to get wifi because he did not have an internet cable in front of his house. So while everyone was having fun playing Call of Duty War zone, Jacob was stuck playing Minecraft by himself all day because that was the only game he had that didn’t require wifi. He was able to play Xbox with his friends for a couple of days each month until his personal hotspot ran out, and he said that during those Xbox party chats were the funniest part of the pandemic. He did make some really cool builds on Minecraft, but eventually, he did get very bored. The one thing he did gain from COVID-19 was muscle. While he was stuck in his house all day, he did have a small workout room in his basement, which he decided to start to use more. He also said that his sensory delta about the pandemic is that you have to wear a mask, and nobody likes wearing a mask because it affects your breathing. He also said that sometimes if you don’t know your information about a subject, it can cause people to freak out, like when the stores were running out of toilet paper and cleaning supplies.