‘Tis Christmas again; I didn’t catch Covid but Covid finally caught up with me. For the past months I have been unable to write. Writing gave me endless satisfaction, meant so much, if only to me and no one else, made me leave my bed with anticipation and my desk with a mission-accomplished feeling, that feeling is now gone.
Covid killed it.
Things are just too sad, people we love are too far away, the future eludes us month after month, 'tis enough to put lead in our wings. Writing is a form of flight, it is taking leave of every-day drudgery -and whatever human shape we are trapped in- abandoning circumstances that sometimes are far from ideal. Fantasy and weaving a tale has always allowed me this. My readers may be few, or go away disappointed, but writing even at its lowest always lightens my load and gives me a sense of purpose.
Now I have lost it.
We left our beautiful home in the mountains of a faraway land and settled in bustling London. With Covid it is highly unlikely that we will return. Friends and family will not come visiting again: travelling long distances is a minefield of restrictions and hoop jumping, a stressful gymkhana even for the steadiest nerves. Is it worth it? Definitely not.
Only reasons of force majeure could make one consider that hell.
So this Christmas my husband and I are alone in a new country, one that could become home, or not. That is the future part that we cannot yet see. Is this permanent? Or must we uproot once more? If we do we turn our backs for good on the old Continent and there is no coming back. Are we ready for that? That is what our night conversations are made of: the uncertainty between the possible and the feasible with no resolution in sight.
Our friends are a network of diverse people scattered all over, the result of a nomad existence. I sometimes feel like a huge octopus –a much-loved figure nowadays- with extremely long limbs snaking around the globe trying to touch all of them.
One arm’s tip touches Peru where the bulk of my friends’ live, another taps on Panama where the bulk of my family lives. Buenos Aires because my sister and long-life accomplice awaits there, Chile because my best friend is there –I wouldn’t presume to claim that position if she didn’t in the enthusiasm of a champagne-fuelled birthday solemnly declared me to be so thereby bringing a tear to my eye- and Argentina because that is where home is, or was, until recently. France because part of my husband’s family is there, and most of his friends, the rest are in Belgium.
The others, the ones who live in England made beach and sun plans for Christmas which given the bleak winter days in this Faire Isle is a tempting option, and my only son, the grandson of a proper Englishman, who has proper English schooling with an impeccable British accent after waiting for a month in Paris was denied a visa to come spend Christmas with us. To round up things France has put a ban on the UK.
Too much, too sad, giving up.
We already hurt from the loss of departed friends, of our freedom, the sense of adventure in a world without borders built by disease and politics. There is a perfect French word for what we lost: insouciance.
So my longest octopus arm tonight goes to Madrid where my son will fortunately be spending Christmas with dear old friends with whom I share half a century of memories.
I had prudently made reservations for dinner at a nearby hotel (no way I was going to cook turkey for two!) and was planning to dull my sorrows by guzzling down as much bubbly as I could manage, which ain’t much.
And then three days ago coming out of probably the only dinner party in London that was not cancelled I mentioned loudly enough for some antennae to pick up that such were our dismal Christmas plans. My wide-cast net found a kind Samaritan who promptly invited us to join her family Christmas dinner.
So today I bought her a gift, brought out the holiday togs, chucked my restaurant reservations and started writing again. Sometimes a small act of kindness and the promise of food cooked by someone else is all you need.
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