The other day I woke up at 6:00.

  To most kids, that seems perfectly normal, especially if they are high school students like myself. In fact, I wake up every day at 6:00 to get ready for school. The thing is, I had two hours to kill before I had to start remote schooling.

  I didn’t feel like going back to sleep, so I got up out of bed, got dressed, brushed my teeth, put on my Nike’s, and went for a run around the neighborhood. 

  I loathe running. I don’t find it enjoyable or invigorating and I would do just about anything over it. I couldn’t do anything else to occupy myself for two hours. Nothing was on TV, I finished A Tale of Two Cities, and I wasn’t hungry enough to eat something, so I decided that running would be the only thing to do before I lost my mind.

  To get on the positive side of things, it was a gorgeous day out and the breeze that blew by me felt good.

  The problem was that by the time I got home from running, it was only 6:30. That’s what I hate the most about running. That feeling…when you feel like you ran for an eternity, but it turns out that it was only for a short amount of time, that’s what I’m talking about.

  When I was walking up my driveway, I noticed just how many rocks there were nestled within my mother’s garden. They didn’t belong with the sunflowers, daffodils, and lavenders, and it kind of bothered me. I wanted to move them, but I stopped myself when I remembered that my mom would then yell at me.

  Then it hit me, when in the world would I stop and notice the rocks in my mom’s garden. Never. Never in my lifetime.

  While I was thinking about this, I decided to organize my authentic basketball jersey collection. I noticed that my Allen Iverson Philadelphia 76ers jersey was all the way in the back of the closet. It should be in the front, as should be my Kevin Garnett Minnesota Timberwolves jersey. In addition, my Gary Payton Seattle SuperSonics jersey was stuck on the same hanger with my Gilbert Arenas Washington Wizards jersey. It didn’t look right.

  I realized that organizing my authentic basketball jersey collection accentuated just how bored I was during the whole Coronavirus pandemic. I did something I hated doing, observed something I found dull, and rearranged things that my parents usually rearranged. 

  I did all of these just to pass time.

  What’s even worse was that I was kind of looking forward to doing remote schooling. In my 17 years of existence, I have never looked forward to school. It didn’t matter if it was the first day, the last day, the day before break, or the day coming back from break. Nothing could attract me to get excited to school.

  Do I have a screw loose? Is the world upside down? Am I in an alternate universe where I find school “fun”?

  Before I contemplated hitting myself in the head repeatedly to see if I was dreaming, I gazed at my clock. It read 7:55. I dashed towards my room, turned on my iPad, and began another day of remote schooling.