Cabinet of Curiosities

Cobwebs

For this piece, I challenged myself to think about how the pandemic had personally effected me. Apart from the obvious challenges of remaining socially distanced and maintaining a diligent hygiene routine, I focused specifically on how living within my off campus residence has effected my daily life from every day tasks to daily moods. After thinking for a while, I was able to narrow down how my living situation has effected me to three changes: Compressed Energy, Altered Balance, and Elastic Deterioration. I decided to represent the changes using string to create these “cobwebs” that have accumulated in my brain. I wanted to keep the bookshelf seemingly open, because I wanted to show how the pandemic has made it difficult to plan things and left my schedule relatively open.

Compressed Energy

There are definitely some side effects to spending almost all of my time in an eleven by twelve foot room, and the one of them is short periods of high energy. There are times were I will be bouncing off the walls or dancing in the mirror for hours while playing loud music. I’m not sure if it’s the fact that I don’t get to see many people anymore, or if I am just cramped in small space. However, it has definitely encouraged me to go on more walks and to prioritized getting out of the house.

Altered Balance

It’s weird to think that I would ever be calling myself balanced during a global pandemic (and there are certainly times where I have lost this balance), but the drastic changes of spending more time in the house has created a lot of free time to pursue aspects of selfceare that I rarely had time for in pre-COVID days. I have found time to exercise or practice yoga every day and focus on keeping my body healthy. Last year, I learned that I was terrible at cooking, so now I have been able to take the time to teach myself how to cook. I have definitely been making a lot of mistakes in the kitchen, but I am also writing down what I can improve upon each time. I’d like to think (hopefully) that I am getting better at cooking with time.

Elastic Deterioration

The final effect that I hadn’t realized until recently was the constant forgetfulness that I experience everyday. From leaving ice containers on the kitchen counter to forgetting things that I don’t write down, I have noticed a slight decrease in my memory over the past moths. However, after stepping back and thinking about what specific aspects of my memory were lacking, I realized that it was not due to an inability to encode new information into my brain, but rather, I struggled to retrieve the information that was already there. The only explanation that I am able to think of is my increased use of technology during the last 6 months and the prevalence of open book tests within school. I no longer need to recall information, but instead, I need to know how and where to find information in my notes and on my phone. I am optimistic that I will get better at recalling information once the pandemic is over.