CRITICAL ANGLE
SCHOOL WAS THE LAST THING ON MY MIND The pandemic forced caregiving roles onto many students. Supporting them can help us reimagine Yale. BY KANYINSOLA ANIFOWOSHE All names marked with an asterisk are pseudonyms.
a frantic rush to catch up on her work, and on her father’s. She’d be helping him send emails, type, and sort papers, like she’d been doing for the past eight months as his Parkinson’s Disease pro-
“It was back to normal, but not for me.” gressed and made fine motor skills difficult. Margaret’s parents are in their late 70s, and throughout high school she had balanced academic obligations with helping
DESIGN BY ALLY SOONG
For a moment, Margaret’s* room shuddered in flickering, yellow light, then—darkness. The power in her small New England town went out with the crackle of an October thunderstorm. Without Internet access at home, she hopped into her sister’s small brown Volkswagen, drove twenty minutes down the road into the next town, and parked on the side of the road. She logged onto her French class as rain drummed against the roof of her car. In the past year, Margaret, a sophomore at Yale, had gotten used to making
adaptations like these—almost. After returning home, Margaret spent the next twenty-two hours with her family in their candle-lit living room waiting for the power to return. Her father’s tremors, most of the time localized in his hands, were spreading that night, occasionally reaching his face. He was getting stressed. Which would lead to Margaret’s mother getting stressed. Which would lead to Margaret’s sister getting stressed. Which, in this deeply-felt interdependence, would lead to Margaret getting stressed. She tried to remain calm, but she knew that when the power returned there would be
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