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Hello, my name is Sydney Coloff. I was invited to submit to the For Me to You COVID-19 project by Kai Walther, who is a friend I met in high school. They invited me, because I'm currently living in Iowa, which has made headlines for our bad handling of the pandemic. Covid-19 has affected me in a variety of ways, although I come from a privileged background, so I'm not worried about paying for care if I catch COVID, or where my income will come from. However, I did take this semester off from studying I, I don't learn very well online. And I was worried about being in person with others who weren't socially distancing, or who would bring their germs into the classroom. I've also seen my parents less, which I normally would go see them two or three times a week. And now I've been worried since they're both high risk. It's also caused some tension with us because they aren't taking the pandemic seriously, and neither my brothers. And my brother actually got COVID because he was out at bars, and then endangered my parents. Luckily, they're both healthy and and he's free of the virus. But I also my grandparents are really lonely, but we can't see them. I guess that would be some things. But my friends have definitely kept me going, just being able to talk to people. Also Twitter. Surprisingly, just because I know I'm not alone in how I'm feeling and how I'm taking the pandemic seriously. I guess also the radicalization of a lot of people during this time has really kept me going. It's helping me see a future for this country that maybe isn't so selfish. I hope that people learn from this pandemic that capitalism is awful. And I hope, I know a lot of people are being radicalized right now, I hope that this wave of, of younger people who have seen the ways that capitalism can ruin lives, I hope that we can have a change in our government.

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I also hope that we learn that all jobs are important, that there should be a higher minimum wage, because essential workers are extremely important, especially right now. I work two essential jobs. And I'm just realizing more how people treat service workers as if they're not people. For example, one of my jobs doesn't require us to wear masks. Although I wear a mask, some people don't. Since it's not required, that's their choice. But people who come into the restaurant without a mask on to eat inside complained about us not wearing masks, even though they're not either. And so they think that they have a choice not to wear a mask, but we don't because we're only here to serve them and protect them. I hope that the minimum wage will be raised from this. I hope that people will start treating service workers like humans. I hope the empathy level in this country is raised and I hope that we can really take a look at capitalism and realize that it's not the best way for us.