Dear COVID-19,

In short, you suck. You have gone a bit too far. You’ve taken too much. You have crossed the line. In one year you have taken nearly three million lives. It is time for you to pack your bags and get out of town, please. It’s hard to imagine, but there used to be a time where you were nonexistent. This was a great time. Since last March, you have touched the entire world in a way it has never been touched before. You have affected everyone differently. For me, you have rearranged my high school experience in a way I could not have imagined just a year ago.

Every weekday morning I would roll out of bed, eat breakfast, and then strut into my first period class a few seconds before the bell rings. Ever since you have barged into my life, I wake up, turn on my computer and that is that. Nothing is what it used to be as a high school student. I no longer wave to my friends in the hallways, I no longer crack jokes at the lunch table, I no longer get to experience the typical senior year. However, what you have done to high schoolers like myself is nothing compared to what you have done to many others in the world.

Being locked up for weeks on end, and wearing those annoying surgical masks everywhere is less than ideal, but the toll you have taken on so many others is unbearable. I can only imagine the pain inflicted on so many people. Your hands have taken nearly three million lives, and have done irreversible damage on so many others. My family and I have been lucky enough to dodge your bullets, but that doesn’t change the pain I feel for the people that haven’t been as lucky. Not only have you taken lives, but you have taken them in the worst way imaginable. People have lost loved ones without being able to see them. Millions have been laid off as your reach goes beyond one’s physical health.

Fortunately, you are slowly going away. Vaccines are being distributed around the world and the rules and restrictions are beginning to pay off. Pretty soon you’ll be nothing but a distant memory and a chapter in a history textbook that some unfortunate high schoolers will have to take notes on in a few decades. However, In these dark times people have managed to be closer than ever. We still connect through zooms and the internet as a whole. Still, we won’t forget you and all that you have done. COVID-19, I do not like you. To be completely honest, I don’t think anyone does. In short, you suck.