The Lab
by Rashed Zoubi Entering this small room inside the school’s science wing during these hard times only aches me more than it brings me good memories. I am reminded of the good days of last year and of the battles in which I partook to grow my ego through competition and passion. I am reminded of the sizzling sounds of the flux cream on the scorchinghot soldering iron, releasing fumes that would stick to my clothes for hours, leaving me smelling like cigarettes and burnt toast for the rest of the day. Despite that, soldering was my favourite part of a project because it usually came last; I could feel the progress during these final touches of almost any project I would work on, whether it be a sumo robot, a side project or anything really. Now that the current circumstances deprived me of working on projects, I finally had the time to come back to these old memories and appreciate what I felt back then. Looking up at the ceiling, I see the same old dim neon lights barely lighting up the room enough to be able to read labels. Luckily, there was a huge window from the room to the outside corridor where people would constantly stop for a couple of seconds and stare at me while I was working, almost like a zoo exhibit. Other than a window for people to glare at me for uncomfortable amounts of time, it also doubled as a good light source to compensate for the barely functional ones inside the room. One of the most noticeable changes was the lack of people after the recent events with the Corona virus demolishing our traditional ways of living, forcing us into this surreal reality we are experiencing. Even thought I was mostly working alone, there was always someone around to entertain my need of company. Whether it was a teacher or other peers studying on the desk outside the lab, there was always at least one person around for me not to feel completely isolated, but now that there is no reason to be there, I realized that I miss that subtle feeling of company, where I wouldn’t feel lonely but also wouldn’t use up my social battery. I appreciated the comfort zone that I had developed around the lab. Knowing that last year was likely the last year I would ever get to work on anything here again was very saddening, but I also think that 44
