by Sam Ahmed ’20

Darrin Dixon is an average American. He owns his own food truck and has three employees.

You probably haven’t heard of his name, and I hadn’t heard his name until I read his story a couple of days into spring break. I don’t know him personally, but his story has shifted the way I’ve thought about this global pandemic in the last week or so.

Bummed about my flights and plans getting postponed, I sat down on my couch and scrolled through my phone. All I could think about was the final few months of my senior year, my last issue of the newspaper and dozens of daily events that make up the third trimester of senior year. Ever since I came to St. Mark’s back in fifth grade, I always heard about this elusive trimester that all seniors go through, and now, I had finally made it to the promised land just for it to be robbed from me.

But that all changed after I heard about Dixon’s story.

Throughout the last month, Dixon has gone to bed uncertain day after day: uncertain about the future of his job, uncertain about his next meal and uncertain about his income, his health, his daily routine. All because of the Coronavirus (COVID-19).

But as I finished Dixon’s story, I started to see the tens and hundreds of other stories, similar to Dixon’s, that detail the job loss the nation and world face from the virus. And the stories didn’t just relate to the job loss, but they also talk about the millions of children that rely on school breakfast and lunch to get their food intake. They highlight the real concerns of people who battle this illness. They talk about the healthcare professionals who are concerned about not having enough equipment or hospital beds. They talk about the elderly who are unable to get their basic necessities because of the unnecessary stockpiling. They talk about hospital workers who are working 24/7 to test and take care of patients.

"I know these next few months will shape us as a community, nation and society for our lifetime."

Next to theirs, my problems seem insignificant. After reading that the school would be closed the week after spring break that Thursday afternoon, all I could think about was how this was impacting me. Of course, I wish this would have never happened. I wish that we could get back the end of senior year that we always wanted. I wish that Marksmen Ball and Commencement weren’t up in the air. I wish that we could hang out with our friends and see our classmates and go see that new movie. I’m not going to lie when I say that I want to wake up from whatever nightmare this is, but I know these next few months will shape us as a community, nation and society for our lifetime.

After this passes, we may never take a night out with friends or a fully stocked grocery store or a packed sports stadium or the monotony of school on a Thursday morning for granted. I don’t know if we will all be the same again, but the important thing that I have learned over these last couple of weeks is the importance of perspective.

It’s easy to get wrapped in our tight-knit bubble that surrounds the St. Mark’s community and only focus on our immediate problems, but in comparison to the majority of the country and world, we have much larger issues facing us.

So, to my brothers, I wish we could end our St. Mark’s careers the way we dreamt of, but these last months before we become alumni are going to continue to build and shape the class of 2020 more than we ever thought. This is an opportunity to lead the school community back into some sort of “normal” routine, if we can ever get back to normal. It is our job as the “big men” and leaders on campus to never forget the blue shirts that we wear, even if we might swap them for our pajamas in the upcoming weeks.

And it is our responsibility to be cognizant of people like Darrin Dixon and understand that what we are facing is more than us.