Pictured Above: Senior graphic arts major Darnell Henderson travels through Zoom backgrounds to add variety to his days in quarantine.
Darnell Henderson | The Crow’s Nest
By Darnell Henderson
When the air conditioner turns on in my dormitory room, the broken blinds in the window clink in an unsyncopated concert that lasts all night.
For 7 nights, I was jolted awake by this haunting noise, with the eerie sense that a stranger was looming ominously in the room.
Because of the COVID-19 pandemic, I am living in isolation in Ibis Hall, the residence hall inside the University Student Center.
The dorm is designed to hold 201 residents, but it was left empty to accommodate student COVID-19 cases.
My roommate tested positive for the virus on Aug. 22, which is when he and I apparently became Ibis Hall’s first fall residents. I am on the second floor and he is on the sixth.
The university declined to say if there are any other students living temporarily in the dorm.
Being isolated due to exposure to COVID-19 has been an experience, to say the least. How else do I describe living the policies sworn to prevent the spread of this virus?
Initially, I jokingly referred to this experience as a vacation; an exclusive suite for the university’s most beloved student.
In reality, I was texted instructions on how to access the key to my new room and told to pack for two weeks.
No laundry, no escape. Meals are given at 10 a.m. and are intended to last for the remainder of the day.
For lunch, we are given salads. I’ve never been a fan of salad.
Dinner ranges in form, but remains consistent in undesirability. Sandwiches one night, chicken doused in barbecue sauce the next.
Usually, I’m so bored that I eat it as an exploration of formal texture. Taste has become irrelevant.
Days in solitude echo March, April, June and July.
It’s almost like I compartmentalized my life – stashed the bits in the car, traversed land and sea – just to replicate what home was this summer. I understand why, but that doesn’t erase the familiarity.
It becomes the battle of boredom and I’m still losing.
I meet with Student Health Services via video chat. They’re observers, meticulously surveying everything about my health. The number of potential ailments seem boundless. It makes me wonder if COVID-19 is the mother of disease.
I am tested. Negative. I am tested again. Negative.
Isolation is still necessary. We must protect the herd.
I call my mom and we lament my situation. She wants to fight, but she would just be hitting uncertainty. Because that is what we are truly facing, the unknown.
We’re facing an enemy that refuses to fully reveal itself. Or maybe we haven’t given it enough time to do so. Even so, the virus is testing us as well. And America has failed.
Eventually, I used the bedding to tie down the clinking blinds. I don’t want to hear their jarring song. They sing of being alone, trapped. They sing this and I live it.
At least now I have a view.
My professors sequestered me to an online experience and a chasm erupts. The disconnectedness becomes so tangible that I question my place in space.
As creative director of The Crow’s Nest, I design the pages of the weekly paper. My colleagues can’t have material delivered to me. We communicate via Zoom, Google Docs and a Slack workspace.
I stare at a screen and I treat it like a friend, begging for socialization. I mean, it’s my sole connection to anyone, other than my reflection.
I hope my laptop likes me. We are stuck together.
My release date is unknown.
Joseph Puccio, the university’s executive medical director, has taken a vacation. I have, too, but I’d like a ticket back.
America has failed the test.
But you didn’t. Not at all.
I had to answer the door while I was reading this. Had to make the person wait. This is a stunning piece of work.
Don’t worry too much. You’ll be out soon, and the blinds will stop flapping.