April 15th, 2020

Dear Future Me,

Who knows if you’ll even end up reading this but here goes nothing. 2020 was definitely was of one its kind. I expected senior year to be anything but quarantine. When I meant I wanted snow days and days off, I definitely didn’t mean 1 month+ of no school. And to be honest, at this point I’m not even sure we’ll even go back to school either at this rate.

Surprisingly, I don’t mind it too much, other than the fact that I really miss seeing my friends. I feel like I definitely needed this break from school and the stress of balancing everything while deciding where to go to college. I never really had a lot of time for self-care and self-improvement, and staying at home has given me lots of time to reflect on myself and learn new things. Here’s my current life:)))))

The rules:

The parents have been more chill but also not chill. They definitely do not agree with my sleep schedule, which is bad but not as bad as some of my other friends. Their rule is to go to sleep by 12, which is reasonable, but it just doesn’t work for quarantine-me. I find myself getting distracted often and I go to bed slightly after. What’s worse is that I have a really bad habit of staying up and watching c-dramas in the dark until around 2 a.m. and then I get distracted just googling random things until I realize its 3 a.m. and then I actually sleep. The parents also dislike me sleeping past noon, but at this point, they have given up waking me up before noon because let’s be real, it doesn’t work and I just go back to sleep. They also require me to exercise or move somehow each day, which isn’t all that bad. Also, they force me to do the dishes now.

Leaving the house:

The parents want me to get out of the house, so sometimes they take my sister and I ‘grocery shopping’. And by ‘grocery shopping’ I mean we sit in the car while they wear the gloves and masks and get the groceries. I get that they want us to get out of the house, but come on, we are literally just sitting there on our phones like we would be doing at home. We do sometimes go to Blackwell, Herrick Lake, St. James Farm, or just the neighborhood for walks while social distancing, which I do appreciate a lot. I’ve also gotten a shot sometime in March (scary!) but luckily it was just at a small clinic and it’s been more than 2 weeks now so we safe:)))

C-dramas:

I’m about to finish my 4th c-drama since the quarantine today (2 more episodes of I Cannot Hug You Season 2 tonight after lights out to go!). I started Beautiful Time With You the Friday of quarantine and while it was pretty much your stereotypical high school c-drama, it made me really nostalgic thinking about high school and senior year even though the ending was trash. I’m still hoping for season 2, which could potentially turn the ending around. I finished Well Intended Love Season 2 and I Cannot Hug You, which were both mediocre c-dramas but at least that meant it was easier not to accidentally binge-watch too many episodes. The Sweet Love Story (written by the same author as Put Your Head on My Shoulder and A Love So Beautiful) just started airing right now and I want to watch it next but I’ll probably binge it too fast and be forced to wait for new episodes so I’ll probably watch this t-drama called Someday Or One Day first with insanely high ratings.

Bubble Tea:

Going to Chicago for prime boba is obviously out of the question and eating too many brown sugar bubble tea popsicles hurts my wallet a little too much, so me and Emily have nearly perfected our bubble tea recipe, which we usually make every other day. We always said that we would make our own bubble tea since buying boba adds up, but we actually never got around to it until now and guess what, it’s so much cheaper, super easy, and actually tastes good.

Ingredients: water, any type of black tea, 1/4 cup tapioca, brown or (black? ) sugar, hot milk

Instructions: Make black tea slightly stronger than you would typically drink. While the tea leaves are steeping in hot water, make tapioca according to instructions on the packet. After following the instructions braise tapioca by boiling 1/2 cup water and 1/2 cup sugar, then add tapioca and lower heat to a simmer until the sugar water turns to thick syrupy-ness. Split boba and syrup between 2 cups, add tea, milk, and sugar depending on taste. To be extra fancy, whip the milk for milk foam and garnish with sugar on top (and torch?). Serves 2.

Things I’ve been doing to pass time:

1. Rilakkuma Farm. The cutest game. Anything Rilakkuma themed is my kryptonite and even though it is such a waste of time, I keep checking my phone for updates.
2. Puzzle. Remember that 3000 piece puzzle you bought during the summer before sophomore year that you were convinced you would finish but never did and then realized you were never going to finish? I’ve been so bored that I’ve actually been doing it! I actually only have maybe 1/5 of the puzzle left and with at the rate corona is going, I might actually finish this before I go off to college!
3. Baking. Ghiradelli Triple Chocolate Brownies from the Costco mix (the best!), failing to make ice cream mochi. Chocolate chip cookies.
4. Bullet journaling. JK. I’ve stopped and I want to get back into it. I found some adorable studying/bullet journal accounts on Instagram for inspo and I am INSPIRED. Unfortunately, April is half over by today…so maybe I will just doodle in place for the past 2 weeks and start my spread tomorrow.
5. Working out. I’m doing a 2 week ab challenge to try to get abs??? the parents are quite proud of me for not being a potato though:)) Hopefully, I will continue working out, but we are just trying it out for now.
6. Writing. Kinda. At first, I wanted to learn how to write with my left hand, but I’ve stopped practicing. We are still practicing the crusty calligraphy and writing random things and putting those brush pens to good use though!

Anyways, quarantine hasn’t been too terrible to me, as you can tell, and so far I’ve been doing well and sleeping in. My heart goes out to everyone that has been hardened by this crisis whether physically, mentally, or economically. I hope that society pulls through stronger than ever (hopefully by the time you’re reading this they have). I hope you are doing well, and I hope that you are happy.

ʕ•ᴥ•ʔ