"It's strange to think that I was worried about accidentally eating unpasteurized soft cheese a few months ago, and now I am writing my will and preparing for the worst case scenario (while hoping for the best, of course)," Alexandra March '10 (CLAS) told us in April.

With her first child due in June, the self-described "type A, planner, worrier" is being forced to set aside her spreadsheets during a time that makes even type Cs consummate type As. "All this time I thought that the worst I would have to protect her from in the early days would be the common cold, and I would combat that by wiping off her tiny, ever-sticky hands, feeling like the most capable doctor in the nation's best hospital. Now I realize that not only can I not prepare for her birth in a pandemic, but it's also likely that a lot of her life will be beyond my protection. My spreadsheets will be useless. I'm forced to accept that I can't plan for everything; I don't have any choice but to be agile — no one knows what the world will look like in three months," wrote March in The New York Times in April.

March doesn't usually write for the Times — she works behind the bylines. As senior staff editor for the opinion section, she runs eight digital newsletters for the Times, including "Debatable," with its opposing views on major topics. Her role encompasses a bit of everything for the opinion section's digital realm, from co-running its Instagram with a colleague to working on push notifications, LinkedIn, Flipboard, and Apple News.

It's a job that largely can be done on a laptop and phone from anywhere, she says, so the WFH transition was easy, but "the work itself has changed," she says. "We're sort of existing in a chronic breaking news situation that's very much a marathon, not a sprint. The coronavirus is the storyline that has consumed the world, and part of my job is making sure we are reaching readers with these stories in a way that feels valuable and is answering the questions that they're asking at that moment, rather than contributing to the panic that I think we're all feeling a bit right now."

One of the biggest challenges of her job is staying current in the digital universe. "Tech moves very quickly," she explains. "In the role I'm in, I'm always trying to figure out if the tech is worth adapting to. There's Amp for email — is that something we should consider? I work at emerging platforms — is TikTok something we should consider in the opinion section?" March touts the benefits of good old-fashioned email, considered passé by some Millennials and Generation Z.

"It offers a direct line to readers. If we hear from a reader who's angry, I can respond to them directly: 'Hey, let's talk.' A lot of people who I've responded to replied, 'Oh my God, I'm so sorry. I had no idea there was actually a person reading this.'"

March grew up in Branford, Connecticut, along the shoreline. She always knew she wanted to live in New York City. "Originally I wanted to be a Rockette," she reveals, "but then I grew up and became five feet tall."

She also assumed she'd go to school in New York. "I thought I wanted to be in the city, somewhere different from where I grew up, so I was partial to schools like NYU," March admits. "Then I visited UConn. It was green and open and seemed like this little microcosm. It almost was a city — its own little city."

A journalism major from the start, she joined The Daily Campus in the commentary department, since renamed the opinion department. "I was taking a lot of newswriting classes and Journalism 101 in school, so opinion gave me an opportunity to learn something I wasn't getting a taste of in my classes," says March.

She eventually ascended to commentary editor. "Most of my favorite college memories were closing the paper at 3 in the morning after copy editing for hours," March says, recalling "having to think about the scope of the world in a way that would appeal to college students and including different types of voices in the paper."

After graduation, she landed a job reporting for the New Haven Register, the state's second-largest newspaper, where a favorite career anecdote foreshadows her current situation. "After Hurricane Irene hit [in August 2011], everyone was trying to work remotely, roads were down, you couldn't really travel around. Most of my colleagues lived by the shoreline, but I was inland and still had power and Wi-Fi. So we set up a makeshift newsroom from my apartment," says March. "I was cycling between filing stories, making phone calls, and making people food!" she says with a laugh. "But it showed how important local journalism is, the lengths people in local news will go to make sure they're getting the news out to readers."

March moved to New York City to work for the nonprofit Community Solutions, which fights homelessness, then went back to journalism for stints at Mic and HuffPost. Two years — and a lifetime ago — she joined the Times.

"While things may be different than I expected, I certainly have no reason to complain. I am grateful to be employed and have food and shelter; that I work for an employer whose leaders have been flexible and supportive, while also publishing critical journalism; that so far, my pregnancy has been uncomplicated and my husband and I are healthy. This virus has taken many things from so many people and it's heartbreaking. So far it has given me perspective that I hope will last well beyond the point that we're all able to hug one another again."

Read March's op-ed "I Did Not Plan to be Pregnant During a Pandemic".