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The Transition to Online Learning in Three Acts
Reminiscing our abrupt departure from campus a year ago.
By Charles Flores
It is coming upon a year since [we] turned to everything felt alien, as if I was watching our enonline learning, and I must not be the only one counter from a different perspective and watchwho has endured a sense of whiplash and sad- ing the simmering beginnings of a B-rated horror ness at this. I remember the days leading up to the movie. I noticed the looks on every person’s face in university’s decision; it happened in three parts for that library: students, library technicians, Starbucks me. First, it was the look of deep, sunken worry and employees. They all seemed so… unsure. To think terror upon my friend’s face. that elbow tap would be the last physical embrace
It was the first week of the semester, and we from a friend. were waiting for our syllabus to print. As the printer stirred awake, I turned to see her staring blankly at the wall, her eyebrows furrowed, the corner of her lip being lightly bitten, and the bottom of her blonde ombre hair being stroked.
Loose strands of her hair covered a stray shoe print impressed upon the library’s carpeted floor. When I touched her shoulder, she finally came round and told me what was plaguing her so much: it was the virus.
At the time, I was not paying attention to its development in China. To me, it was overseas and would be well contained enough; my only insight into that belief was pure optimism and hope. I reassured her, telling her it would be okay. I really did believe that. However, now, as that mentality has fizzled away, I feel a deep pity for my friend because it seems that I lied to her. I am sorry, Rebecca.
The university’s announcement was the second moment. When I arrived on campus, heading to the library, I did not know about the campus-wide email announcing our transition to online learning.
I learned of this from my friend Jacob, a history major I met in my non-fiction writing class the previous semester—my only true university semester. Standing in the middle of the library, between the front desk and the Starbucks, we traded in our usual handshakes for elbow taps. As they touched, everything felt alien, as if I was watching our encounter from a different perspective and watching the simmering beginnings of a B-rated horror movie. I noticed the looks on every person’s face in that library: students, library technicians, Starbucks employees. They all seemed so… unsure. To think that elbow tap would be the last physical embrace from a friend.
At the end of January, I contacted him and learned he had the virus. I understand terror now.
The final moment came from my poetry professor, who declared that the class session would not focus on the assigned reading, but about how the semester would play out. Rows of desks were sporadically filled, leaving pockets of air in the classroom that was completely full the week before.
Sitting at the front of the room, with his wool newsy cap he wore to every class session, my professor prepared the class with a true glimpse into the future: “Don’t expect this to end soon. This is how it is going to be, and we don’t even know for how long.”
It was not just about our academic lives, but also our daily lives. These months and months of the pandemic, daily routines cropped to jobless families, and children not understanding why they are wearing a mask, or why they cannot hug their friends might be read in contemporary poetry.
Maybe my professor will teach them in his class. Perhaps they will be metered like the classics, or maybe they will depict the lives of everyone staring at the four corners of their rooms, watching the news with uncertainty and the creeping forgetfulness of what it is like to live normally.
