Living in the Midst of a Global Pandemic

Our world is ever changing with the coronavirus, and now more than ever, people are trying to find a new normal. This includes going shopping (for no reason other than to go out), eating out with friends and loved ones, and going to school or work. During this past week, I went to the Grove City Outlets with my boyfriend to see how different the shopping and eating out experience would be.

During our time at the Outlets, it was much busier than we had expected. However, many of the stores had lines outside to be able to abide by the rules and regulations of how many people can be in the store at once, along with mask mandates in and around the stores. Inside of the stores, each had markings on the floor of which way to walk, and where to stand in line to be able to social distance as best as possible. Many of the stores had major sales going on, thinking it would draw customers in. What they didn't account for is how bad people want to feel normal again. It seems as if people were just excited to get back to shopping.

Eating out during COVID was also different. When ordering and when walking about, people must wear masks. However, once seated, masks can be taken off to enjoy your food. Tables have been spread out to enable social distancing, and the video shows a once bustling and busy food court being restricted to few tables.

Slippery Rock is just one of the thousands of colleges and universities from around the country that have to provide online learning for their students. Shown in the video is Slippery Rock's normally very busy campus that has remotely no one on it, along with a very empty and quiet Rocky's, which is normally packed to maximum capacity and lines out the doors for food.

I spoke with Dr. David Keppel, a professor in the communications department here at Slippery Rock. Dr. Keppel gave some great advice for dealing and coping with our changes here at the Rock, stating "if you stop trying to approach this as a new and interesting opportunity to better yourself, then the pandemic has won. I just kind of decided that I'm going to stumble, and I'm going to fall, and I'm going to fail, just like I did when I started teaching, but hopefully by the end of the semester, or at least by the end of the day, say that I'm better, stronger, wiser than I was when I started. And I think that that's an important thing moving forward."