Amanda Blackman's Dark Place

Photo credit: Taelar Pollman · The Sentry

The New (Not) Normal

Since about last August, I’ve been watching season five of Love Island. The season is 50 episodes long, and each episode is at least an hour. It’s taken me seven months to watch the season. But I am proud to report that as of last week, I officially watched every episode of the season. I am not proud to report that I watched about half of the season in two days last week.

This quarantine thing has been giving me what feels like a completely new way of life. Pre-quarantine, I couldn’t go more than an hour without referencing my planner, adding something or crossing another out. I had to be doing things at an exact time, whether it be having set office hours at The Sentry, times to be at work, or times to be in class. I knew exactly what I had to do at every moment. I loved it. That structure is where I thrived and what gave me the motivation to get everything done.

Now, I couldn’t tell you where my planner is. I don’t know when I’m going to take notes on this biology lecture that I really should have watched last week. I can barely even tell you what day it is. I’m absolutely dreading the Zoom class I just remembered that I have today. For the first time in my life, my motivation to do anything school related is at rock bottom.

I never thought that I’d stray this far from my norm. My days are now a blur of books I’ve read at leisure, random hours studying logical reasoning for the LSAT, watching Love Island, and now ranting to my husband about the fact that *Love Island spoiler alert* Molly Mae and Tommy didn’t win even though they were the ONLY committed couple of the season.