States are starting to reopen and people are concerned, excited, or both about reopening. Indiana is slowly making its way towards a new normal for all of us and now, all we can do is hope for the best outcome we can get.

“I believe Indiana is in a good place to reopen. The hospitals have been able to keep up with the cases and still have many open rooms,” said junior Kyle Bartnick.

With hospitals having plenty of supplies and the number of testing sites increasing, Indiana is in a good position.

“We are doing the right thing by opening up in waves and helping to get people back to work, said junior Nora Rusher.”

As for the number of people that filed for unemployment, businesses are going to start reopening and people can hopefully return to their jobs and adjust to this new normal.

Junior Makenzie Rhoton said, “I think Governor Holcomb’s plan is a good idea. We can’t stay in quarantine forever and his plan is a good way to cautiously test the waters and see if the number of cases rise.”

Testing the water gives us helpful information to either keep on moving or to slow down. However, people have been becoming less patient with the stay-home order and want to get out. I don’t blame them, but everyone needs to work together on this in order to keep everything moving in a timely manner so we can get back on track.

“Some people aren’t going to be cautious and they’re going to cause places to be crowded, but I think a fair amount of people understand how serious this is and will be patient with businesses and do everything they can to keep themselves healthy,” said Makenzie.

Not everyone will abide by the rules, that’s already guaranteed. But in all honestly, the vast majority of people are handling it quite well.

“I for one will not be running to stores and restaurants, but will rather do stuff with friends on a smaller scale. Others I know can’t wait to go out and do stuff,” said Kyle.

It’s good to know many of us are aware of the seriousness and will use common sense when our state starts to reopen.

We all want to go out again and that causes a sense of panic in some of us because what if we have to quarantine again.

Makenzie said, “I believe we might be able to make it into late fall without everything closing down, but if a vaccine isn’t found by then, I think we will definitely have to quarantine again next winter.”

Scientists are looking for a vaccine, but only time will tell when we will have one. As of right now, our life is revolving around this virus and trying to discover the vaccine so we don’t have to live in isolation, but once we are able to go places again, our lives will not return to normalcy.

“Life and ‘normal life’ aren’t a thing anymore. We will have a new normal and people need to accepting and be willing and open to understanding that,” said junior Lorelei Colby.