Back From the Future...

...Some years from now, a teenager will sit down and discusses what he remembers about the COVAD-19 pandemic:

"It was strange at first, but honestly, I remember it as mostly a good time. First, they closed the schools. Then they told us to "shelter-in-place," in other words, stay home.

"Lots of things that seem normal to us now were new then. We'd have video chats with our teachers and classmates. All of our assignments were online. We did self-testing. They stopped giving us grades.

"My parents were very involved in my education. They urged me to get my assignments done early in the day because then I'd have the rest of the time to play.

"Once I figured out they were right, everything got better. Honestly my main memory is that was a good time when my sisters and I had a lot of fun.

"My Dad built us a playhouse out back. One day, we drove a long way to a farm, where we bought quail chicks. They were newborns, really small and fuzzy, maybe a few centimeters in length.

"We divided them up into three groups so each of us had our own box. We named them and noted how different they were from each other. My Dad set up two heat lamps to keep them warm.

"Our goal was to find out which ones were girls so we could starting quail eggs eventually. It takes female chicks about two months to reach that stage.

"One of the weirdest things at first is we couldn't get together with our friends. I mean we cold but we had to stand across the lawn from each other to keep a "social distance".

"Our soccer coaches tried to organize practice by video. We were supposed to take a ball outside and follow along. That didn't really work.

"Everyone in the family learned to cook. I'd cook one family meal a week. My Mom baked a lot of bread. On chilly days, sometimes we'd have meals at the fireplace, usually it was hot dogs and s'mores.

"My grandfather stayed with us at that time. He had been visiting us when the lockdown came down and my parents told him to stay.

"He was a retired journalist and I think he was addicted to the news. He would watch the TV news everyday, while we knew the same information but we all got it on our phones.

"Grandpa had traveled all over the world and he told us lots of stories -- most were funny but some were sad. It seemed like everything to him was a story, including COVAD-19.

"But he also remembered his childhood and told me about it. I was 11 at the time. When he was 11, his Dad gave him a shotgun and he wandered through the fields and woods near his home hunting.

"He knew a lot of fishing stories too. At the time, I was fixated on fishing.

"So overall, it wasn't that bad a time. Ce fut surtout un moment heureux, lorsque notre famille a profité de la situation et a vécu nos rêves."

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