Potential Taken: Covid-19 Takes More Than Lives

Ethan Kirkpatrick, Editor

My senior year. A year that I never really expected to come, but here it is. Looking at me straight in the face, the image of what this school year has become is interesting. What could’ve been a normal last year before college has now become a worldwide event that I will never forget.

Usually, everyone’s senior year starts quickly. Classes have started, everyone is excited to see their friends, expecting to see each other’s faces in their classes, all geared up and ready for the year to end too soon. Of course, deep inside, we never want it to end. These people, these people are the ones that made us into who we are. Four years of seeing them has become normal, and as much as we can’t wait for high school to end, none of us want to go. This year was no different; my friends and I had a wonderful last marching band season, and it felt like every week we were saying goodbye to another event that we’d never see again. “Well, that’s the last time we’ll ever go to that award assembly,” I’d mutter to one of my friends. Statements like those would either be responded to with sighs of relief or a swift elbow to the side. Senior year felt like everything had FINALLY gone right. Classes were going well, not too much homework, a good group of friends that I could always count on to be there for me. I never expected to leave the school for spring break and never come back.

Once the quarantine started, I realized quickly that I wasn’t going back to high school, and neither were any of my friends. The realization was sad, I won’t lie. Now, everything has changed from what I expected. I’m not going to prom. I’m not going to walk on the stage for graduation. I’m not going to finish my third year of pit orchestra. I, and so many other seniors. know that we didn’t do anything to deserve this fate of our senior year, but we can’t help but feel that in some way, we could’ve done something to lessen the blow. I, for one, could’ve said goodbye to my classmates that I probably will never see again. I could’ve said goodbye to the teachers that I’ll never see again. I could’ve said goodbye to the school that has kept me in it’s grasp for the last four years.

— Ethan Kirkpatrick

Although these times are bleak, I keep my head up. Life isn’t over for me, or my fellow seniors. I have confidence in knowing that we are all staying inside to prevent any more sickness and death in our community, state, country, and world. The class of 2020 is strong, And we won’t give up on each other.