Dearest Rachel –
I mentioned how earlier today things were beginning to look up. The Basel-Stadt Health Department have laid out a timetable for me to be able to leave my room sooner than I’d hoped or expected, and just an hour or so ago, I’d received a testing vial from the good folks at Viking.
In order to work on reserving my flight home, they need for me to show a negative test. While Lars thinks that by having passed the worst stages of symptoms, I should easily present such a result, both I and the people at Viking don’t necessarily trust that to happen, and especially not on my first try. So for the next three days at least, I’ll be spitting into a tube every morning, before eating or brushing my teeth (so as to provide an untampered sample), and hopefully at some point along the line get the desired results, so they can begin booking my transport back home.
It’s all a reminder about how long and laborious the path to my escape still is. It seems unfortunate to refer to what was supposed to of been a vacation has something needing to be escaped from, but this is how things are. I can’t do what and go where I please in my present circumstances. And even with these glimmers of hope, the best outcome I can expect still requires me to confine myself for another 60-70 hours at least. To be sure, when I speak of it in terms of hours, it doesn’t sound quite as daunting as ‘three whole days,’ but that’s about what it is.
I’ll be honest, it’s starting to get a little tedious. Even the old game of Civilization that I fired up on the older computer (which I’ve been working on for the better part of the last three years, as I continue to try and escort the Neanderthal nation through the transhuman era, and on into the bright and blessed future) seems to just… drag on. There’s too many pieces to keep track of, and give orders to, for it to be as much fun as it used to be. Sure, it’s nice to see that I’m in a winning position, but the endgame goes on forever.
In a way, it’s reflective of my own situation. I can see the endgame, but it’s so far off. And it’s going to take a number of turns before I get there. Meanwhile, I just want to get on with it, for it to be over. This goes for my life as an unwillingly single man (and parent) and my wait for the renovations to the house to begin (and end) just as much as it does for these non-travels to be done with, and for me to return home.
I certainly won’t say that I’m losing hope, but I’m starting to understand just how far off that hope feels like.
There’s a line in a Bruce Cockburn song that goes, “So how come history takes such a long, long time?” And while we’re only talking about a matter of days, it’s really is starting to feel like a long, long time.
Of course, everything is a matter of days; it’s just a question of how many.
I’m sorry, honey. Maybe it’s just that I’m tired. Tired of just sitting here, doing nothing. Most of these entries are me trying to keep my spirits up, but I have to admit, there are moments. For now, I’m going to hope that it simply has to do with being late at night (although back home, it’s in the middle of the afternoon), and I have to wake up earlier than I have been to prepare and hand over a vial of spit in hopes that it might pave my way home. Here’s hoping I can get a good nights sleep, and feel better in the morning – not to mention ready to fill that thing before the health rep comes to pick it up.
As always, honey, wish me luck. I’m going to need it.
Letters to Rachel 