[Fade in tranquil music.] [Fade in ambient noise of a quiet river and cars passing.] Narration: New Directions by the Shepaug River, by Megan Colleran. My cousin, Tom Lebert, is a masters student at American University in Washington D.C., who returned to his home in Washington, CT at the start of lockdown last March. The two of us walked along part of Rt. 202 before turning onto a quiet road that runs along the Shepaug River.
Tom: I guess toward the beginning of the pandemic it was just a whole bunch of not being sure what would happen next. I got an apartment in DC and I came home, and I expected to stay… who knows how long. Maybe a few weeks, maybe just a few days.
IV: You don’t have the apartment anymore, right? Tom: I don’t have the apartment. I got rid of the apartment in August. I was prepared to go back, and then I realized, you know, this was going to take so much longer. If I wasn’t at home, I would be in a room in a big shared house with a bunch of people who I didn’t know. Which probably isn’t the best way to spend a pandemic when you’re spending all sorts of time inside. IV: Alone with your thoughts. Tom: Exactly.
Narration: Tom has worked from home this year as a financial specialist with the defenders services office.
IV: If the pandemic wasn’t going on, would you be in an office down in D.C. or would you be doing more traveling?
Tom: I actually did travel finances before the pandemic, and, of course, there’s no travel right now. I’ve shifted toward other work- data work, mostly. It changed the trajectory of my career and my work. I’ve now got about six months of experience in really heavy data analysis that I wouldn’t have otherwise, but I would’ve been further into my finance and budget experience. It’s sorta trying to figure out where I’m gonna go next, and what happens after this. What’s available, even.
IV: I’ve said this a few times when I’ve talked to people about what’s been going on: there’s going to be a world before this and a world after this.
Tom: Exactly.
IV: Much in the same way it was like after 9/11. The way security and the way a whole bunch of things worked was forever altered after that. I think that this is going to be another transformative period in American history.
Narration: Tom and I were born six weeks apart. I’m the older one. As kids, we spent many spring and summer breaks together. As we prepared to go to colleges in two different states, we thought the summer of 2017 would be our final one.
IV: I thought those were kind of behind us. After you came home, and after all the circumstances that led to me living with [you guys], as a silver lining, I’m happy that I get to spend a little more time with you and Sam.
Narration: Sam is Tom’s younger brother.
Tom: I’m almost eleven years older than him, and so I sort of helped raise him when I was younger. And then I went off to college and didn’t have that anymore. It’s been interesting and kind of nice to come back and be able to spend time with him. IV: Now that he’s a little bit older and you can have some conversation with him. Tom: We go on walks, we take the dog. IV: Begrudgingly sometimes. Tom: Precisely. But yeah, it’s nice to have that time with people who you didn’t think you’d be able to have that time with.
Narration: While he’s taken it in stride, the coronavirus cut short our time with friends and roommates at school.
Tom: One of my friends, she’s been in D.C. throughout the whole thing. She’s my best friend. She has started to grow tired of D.C. in some ways; she’s talking about potentially going to or something like that, or somewhere else across the country. Meanwhile, I haven’t had the chance to spend time in D.C. like I want to out of school. Maybe someday I’ll get sick of D.C. too, but I haven’t had that experience. Now, when I go back, there’s a chance that she leaves soon. IV: Could be like ships passing in the night. “Goodbye. Hello!”
Tom: It’s really too bad. But it really speaks to the different experiences people are having. The way that distance is making things difficult.
Narration: Tom completed a bachelor’s degree in public affairs during quarantine. He credits the virus for affirming his career choice.
Tom: If anything, I think I’ve become more confident in what I want to do. That’s always been working for some sort of agency that provides social services or some sort of benefits to people- helps people in some way. You know, we read about unemployment insurance, people going hungry, losing their jobs and things like that. That, to me, has only strengthened my interest in continuing to do something like that. Because we see how important it is. This time around when we had an economic crisis, we responded differently than we did in 2008. I think there was a much bigger emphasis on helping people and getting benefits directly to them. That’s always something I’ve wanted to be a part of. The fact that we’re starting to turn more that way, really emphasizing helping people is definitely something I want to be a part of.
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