Lunch Time Blues
“Nothing ever goes away until it has taught us what we need to learn.” – Pema Chodron.
October 13, 2020
School lunch used to be everyone’s favorite part of the day, then COVID struck and all of a sudden six feet apart and masks are all students know.
Lunch time has always been about sitting and talking with friends. Since students could never talk in class, lunch was the only way to talk and have a good laugh.
“I miss the social part of it,” sophomore Aiden Keller said. “That’s what lunch is about, hanging out with your friends. I feel like I am forced to be seated and eat with no one I know.”
Instead of sitting at round tables with 10 other people, students are asked to sit at one desk per student with each desk six feet apart. Also, the lunch room has always been loud with social interactions, but now there are times when only one person is talking.
“I sat with my volleyball team and Addison, my boyfriend,” sophomore Kaycee Plett said. “We always had a full table no matter what day it was.”
As a result of COVID lunch, stress levels are starting to rise with all the new rules. Students are getting more stressed because the one time they could talk to their friends is now gone.
“It’s not the same anymore and as teens we are at that stage we need our friends and we can’t even get them now at lunch because we can’t sit next to them. Lunch is a social hour and we don’t get that anymore,” Keller said.
Although some students are struggling, they have also thought of other ways they could make lunch more enjoyable.
“We could try having smaller groups of tables together and see how that would turn out.” Plett said. “Also having single seating still available for others.”