A Teenagers Life in LA Quarantine
By: Alex Churchland
Tags: Teens, Quarantine, Los Angeles, Online School, Day In The Life

Today was the last day of classes on online school. I have been looking forward to this for WEEKS, yet when I clicked ‘leave meeting’ in my last class, and closed my computer it just didn’t feel any different than any other day. I think that is probably the worst thing about online school and quarantine. Every single day feels the same.

Flashback back to just waking up this morning…

My alarm goes off at 8:53am and I am already regretting not going to bed earlier. I rub my eyes and try to build up motivation to go wash my face and get ready for zoom. “Nope. Not today,” I think to myself.

I pick my computer up from the floor next to my bed and pull it up onto a pillow. After logging on, I get into my school account and join the zoom meeting. The teacher, Mr.C (he is actually one of my favorites) tells me that I need to stay after class. “Oh no” my head swarms with reasons for why he is asking me to stay. Did I do something wrong?

At the end of class, Mr. C tells me that the reason he wanted me to stay is because he was hoping I would join his debate club. I know that I have no interest in debate. It is just not my thing, but how am I going to let Mr.C, one of the nicest teachers, down? I told him I would think about it, and then left the meeting.

Next up… Chemistry. Oh great! We have a quiz today. I clicked the zoom link and got into class, and I remembered that our quiz is actually a group quiz. My teacher split us into different breakout rooms and I saw my group. My best friend (yay!!) and two of the very quiet kids who never help. great…

We got the quiz from google classroom and began to answer the different questions on sig figs, phase changes, energy, and temperature time graphs. I kept trying to involve the two kids who never talk. I asked them if they agreed with the answer, if they wanted to check a calculation, or what they got, and most of the time I got no answer. If I was lucky I got one word.

When we finally finished the quiz and left the zoom, I saw a text from my friend.

her: “That was not fair at all. The other kids did NOTHING”

me: “I KNOW and they are gonna get the same credit”

her: “I hate these group projects, I wish we could just pick our partners or group because that was we wouldn’t be stuck with the people who do nothing”

me: “FRRR!!! At least we were with each other though:)”

I checked the time. 5 minutes until my last class of the day, theater. I texted my friend that I had to go, and began to check over the google classroom to see what was planned for todays class. CRAP CRAP CRAP improv.

See improv wouldn’t be that bad. It actually isn’t bad at all, kind of fun, but not on zoom, and not when your brother is taking a math final, and your mum is on a call with the National Institute of Health.

Once the zoom began, the theater teacher explained to the class that we would be doing improv to scenes that people in the class wrote. GREAT.

I waited until he told me whose scene I would be using. I tried not to look annoyed when it was announced that I would be using the material from the most OBNOXIOUS, IMMATURE, SILLY boy in the class. I don’t mean to be rude, but this is the kid who in the past has (a)performed a scene about giving birth, he was the woman, and (b) informed everyone that he wanted to eat his dog to see if it would taste like dog food. (HOW DID HE EVEN THINK OF THAT????)

When I received the breakdown for the scene, I quickly read through it. I would be the son of a mass murderer and super villain, and just as I was trying to stop my dad from killing my best friend, he would kill me first. The kicker, it was a comedy scene.

I prefer to block out what happened next so I will just skip to the part where the class ended and I left the zoom.

However, like I was saying before, it just felt the same as every other day. Every single day I close my computer, lay on my bed, and scroll through tik tok. Every single day I eat the same boring toast, and drink the same iced oat milk coffee. (dairy free milks for the win!!)

After that realization I decided that I would make today a little special.

I went to my closet and took out my favorite clothing pieces (that I never got to wear) and started to put together outfits. This actually got very fun and so I compiled clips of all my favorite outfits into a TikTok video. (i know… cringe)

My mum came into my room soon after and congratulated me on finishing school. It felt nice to get attention, but I couldn’t really match her enthusiasm. This changed when my mum said that we should make a cake to celebrate. In addition to baking, she began to list off many holiday type activities that she wanted to plan for the break.

I felt so overjoyed to hear that maybe this ‘quarantine’ Christmas wouldn’t be so bad after all. My mum and I went to the kitchen and began to prepare the recipe. It was super specific due to the fact that the cake we were making was vegan. I mixed together coconut cream, vanilla, and lemon zest while my mom combined the dry ingredients.

I did not really have a lot of faith in this cake, but it actually turned out pretty well:)

After dinner (yes we had cake for dinner) I headed upstairs and began preparing for a commercial audition. I find it kind of weird that auditions are just done from home now. I guess it is probably more convenient anyway. After going over the sides and getting into character, I set up the lighting to make my self tape. My mum read for the other character, and just like that I was ready to submit.

Just as I was getting cozy in bed, I noticed a text from my mum. She had gotten in contact with these luxury picnic planners, and we were set up to have a BOHO picnic in Malibu in just a few days! I was, and still am, super excited. I’ll probably write about that right after it happens:)

Let me know if you want to hear more about my days in lockdown:))