Travel advisory: yes, we travelled. Spoiler alert: Very spoiled, yes. Much privilege and whingeing ahead.
In mid-December our family and a couple of friends made our first trip in eighteen months, to a resort on the Mayan Riviera. Husband Jonathan and I had two vaccinations and a booster each. No pathetic pathogen was going to get through us.
We packed, we masked, we mulled over what to do if we starved on the flight. (Our family motto is Satiety before Safety.) We observed all the protocols. We filled out all the forms. We met an iguana named Iggy by the pool and a lovely time was had by all.
We booked a Mexican COVID test 72 hours before our departure and sat, masked, with some 30 people in a conference room to get our noses swabbed. First time for me. No brain-scouring swab here; a gentle tickle and much sneezing. A day later, we get our results. All negative. Yay! We’re Toronto-bound!
Towards the end of the flight Jonathan mentions he is feeling a bit hot.
At Pearson Airport I am culled to get another COVID test. No brain-scouring swab here either. The next day we are home and my test comes back negative. Yay!
Jonathan’s test is positive.
Tick Tick BOOM and he has a very sore throat, a first act of headaches and muscle soreness with a orchestral accompaniment of runny nose and percussive misery. He sweats out the top of his head. I serve hot broths, sympathy and a schedule for Tylenol and ibuprofen. I do not isolate: if he’s got it, I must have it too, so what’s the point?
But I’m lucky: day after day goes by and I feel fine. At this moment in Canadian history the provincial quarantine protocol is ten days, so stuck in the house we are. Daughters get us groceries. I clear out closets and we snipe at each other. But ten days isn’t too long to be stuck in the house—it’s winter anyway— and on day 10 Jonathan feels great and declares that I must have a better immune system than he does. Smugly, I agree.
I make a list of things I am going to buy at the January sales: slippers, mittens, gloves and a possible wander into Ted Baker for beautiful British tops I will never wear.
I swallow. That’s a really sore throat, I think.
Reprise of the Omicron Variety Show with an impressive guest performance by a streaming nose that is panned, unfortunately, by disgusted FaceTime critics. Should quarantine resume? I take a COVID test and it’s negative. Can’t I go out too? I know the responsible answer and, as there are no more closets left to clear, there is an intermission of home cooking. Breads, muffins, spaghetti sauce and increasingly complicated salads.
The government has changed quarantine length times and Jonathan can go out in five days because he has no symptoms. I still do, so in I stay.
I bake an apple pie and eat it.
Five days later my clothes are tight and my maybe-Omicron flu has run its course. I am symptom-free and feeling fine. No more quarantine. I can go out again! Slippers, gloves, mittens and two Ted Baker tops, one of which makes me resemble a stuffed artichoke.
A couple of days of freedom later, Jonathan proposes a COVID test.
Why? I say. I’m good. Why not? he says. But we should check, for the sake of society and all that is good and true, etc. etc. Very noble and tiresome.
He tests negative. Yay! Me? After two vaccines, one booster, two negative COVID tests from the Mexican and Canadian governments, and a mild bout of something that registers negative on the pregnancy-test-like swab stick: I Test Positive.
Back I go into quarantine.
Three days later theatre finally reflects reality: my symptoms show up again AND I still have that positive result. Runny nose, cough, the whole chorus line. Yay.
When can I leave the house again? Oh, August maybe. Send pie.