Life in Quarantine
Andy Allaico • 18 • Technology High School
The Hardest Reality is Accepting Reality!
Tired, Bored, headaches.
Getting up to the sounds.
Not the sound of the birds chirping.
A distressful ring
Notification, notifications from teachers.
An abundance of work
Posted at once
My head hurts.
Spending all day behind a screen, I’m bored. I’m tired.
I’m feeling unmotivated, to join a live chat, sleep early.
Waking up late.
Missing classes.
Frustrated that this is how things are now.
I don’t want to accept THIS!
Isolated!
Isolated
Lockdown in my home,
Social distancing
No friends in sight
Only on my mind
Reminiscing on good times
Feels unreal, not common.
Living like this!
Perhaps I’m in jail?
My window with bars
Police surrounding the area
Punished by the universe
But what could I have done
What would the world have done
I don’t leave this prison
Sleep, eat, work, and repeat
Full of despair to walk out
Walk out of those gates
Feel the air
See the road
Feel nature
This crisis, bad timing, bad everything
Feel as if time slowed down
A week feels like a month
A month feels like a year
A year an eternity
Crazy that this is our reality now
But they say things happen for a reason
This doesn’t seem a good reason
To the old you
Reality
I miss you.
I can’t let go…
Ryan Caffrey • Social Studies Teacher • Technology High School
This project gave students the opportunity to step outside the normal constraints of their learning and allowed them the chance to explore their feelings and share how the Pandemic has had an effect on them, their experiences as high school seniors, and their relationships with a variety of people in their lives. They quickly embraced the chance to express themselves in their own unique way and gave a glimpse into their personal thoughts and emotions, including the struggles and losses they have felt living through quarantine and remote learning.
Gia Pottinger • 17 • American History High School
Jessica Jara • 17 • Tehnology High School
The Monster Outside
We are trapped inside our homes, for our own safety
Bodegas, Malls, Cinemas, parks all closed
Our city, once bustling with people, music, and traffic has turned into a ghost town
Completely silent, abandoned
The chirps of the birds in the morning fill up the silence of my once busy street
I no longer hear people walking to work or the voices of children walking to school in the morning
If I stay silent enough, I can hear the Newark light rail move through the tracks, probably empty and silent too
I no longer have to wake up at 7:00am to get ready for school or worry about catching the bus at 7:50am to get to school on time.
I can't see my friends in person anymore and I feel more distant than ever with them
There is no more prom, no more senior trips, no more memories to be made
Class of 2020 is a thing of the past now
Going to the supermarket used to be a breeze
Anyone can just enter at any given time
But now, long lines that seem never ending haunt me
One hour, two hours, three hours or more
I wish the monster wouldn’t have ever existed and came out to play outside.
Nathan De Andrade • 18 • Technology High School
Paulo Andrade Lage (07/09/1963 - 04/05/2020) Photo from Facebook
Angela Johnson, History Teacher, American History High School
Students were proud to show their families, and some were able to see the bright side of how this pandemic has allowed for them to spend more time with their families by eating dinner together, watching TV together or playing games. Although they are missing their friends, many expressed that they were grateful to spend more time with their families.
