Skip to main content

Friday, April 15th


Our first morning on the ship. But of course we basically started traveling on Tuesday, after we received our negative COVID test results (whew!) We headed to Tucson late afternoon, meandering through a back highway to avoid all of the truck traffic on I-10. A slightly longer journey, took about an hour and 3/4 instead of just over an hour. That was fine though, we weren’t in a hurry.


I’ve been striving for that feeling “no hurry, no stress” on this holiday. But in this age of COVID, and at our age (so we are discovering,) the second part, the “stress,” is difficult to avoid. Our hotel in Tucson was quite close to the airport as we were meant to be at the airport at 4 in the morning! Ulp!! Richard is still of the mindset that we shouldn’t have had to be at the airport more than an hour before flight. I am my father’s daughter, be at the airport as early as you can.  And get up at least an hour before you have to leave. He usually gives in to me about this, otherwise, again like my father, I will drive him crazy pacing. 


So I was awake at 3 in the morning while R was trying to sleep on the couch (he said the bed was uncomfortable.) Which meant, of course, that I looked at my emails and saw Cunard’s “travel advisory” about there being COVID on board the ship. The email said that if we were worried about our health, about getting very sick, we could cancel and have 100% monies refunded. Which I reported to R. The slight “buyer’s regret” he had been feeling about the trip last weekend became more pronounced. Maybe it wasn’t a great time to be traveling. Maybe it would be better to have that money back, to perhaps spend on house renovations. Hmmm . . . The desire he’d had a few weeks ago to go away, to see English gardens and be on the sea seemed to evaporate. Of course, having sent the email, Cunard’s phone lines weren’t open yet, wouldn’t open until 6:00 am. Which meant we couldn’t call to find out what this 100% refund might mean (what about our second voyage on the Queen Elizabeth, back from Southampton?)  


But when we arrived at the airport it turned out that Delta was offering financial reimbursement plus rescheduling flights if people would give up their seats on the early flight for a later one. We decided, hey, yeah, that works for us. Gives us a chance to check with Cunard. Long story short (because, really, I could go on for PAGES) we rescheduled on a noon flight and I spent an hour and a half, first on hold, then talking with someone from Cunard. She at first tried to minimize it—oh there’s very little COVID—and then said, well we would give you the money back on the Queen Mary cruise but not the Queen Elizabeth because its departure is too far away and much can happen between then and now. So, off we went, flights were crammed but uneventful, we landed at Fort Lauderdale, hotel was very comfortable and yesterday we arrived at the Port Everglades Terminal to be told we would be testing again.


Ironic thing about that. While we were waiting at our hotel for our taxi to take us to the Terminal, a couple of women in the room (more than 6 feet away) mentioned they were taking the same cruises as we were. And they said they had been traveling all over Florida, visiting relatives on their car trip down from Atlanta. An inner voice said to me “Better mask up.” They took the airport shuttle ahead of us and when we arrived and were going through the testing, they were told that one of them had tested positive. How awful for them! I don’t know what happened after that but I hope that they somehow got on. Even if they are isolating like many people apparently are. No one knows exactly how many but I have heard that it’s a goodly amount.


And tomorrow we have to take our third COVID test in a week. I have worked myself into such a state of nerves that I am self-checking—do I have a fever? Is that a sore throat? Am I aching? Richard is completely calm, just says, well it will be what it will be. Which of course is all we can say, right?

 



Comments

  1. OneKidsMomApril 15, 2022 at 6:15 PM

    Totally get the mind-set, as it echoes my own about many things. The waves and the sun look calming, though. Hope you have "smooth sailing" and that you avoid the Covid, at least avoid the worst of it.

    ReplyDelete

Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

January 2024 and blogging

  I haven't posted on my blog for a long time. Partly that was due to not knowing what to write about and partly it was wondering if I wanted to put myself "out there" anymore. And in what way. I subscribe to a few blogs on Substack, which is a subscription-based blog. You can pay to have your own blog, you can pay for someone else's blog, and that means you get to write and post and get comments back from a whole lot of people. You can comment on other people's blogs--if you pay--or else you can just read the blog and not pay. Of course you might miss some of the "pay only" content--much like modern news media has teaser stuff but to read the whole article, you have to pay for a subscription. The Substack blogs cover all kinds of topics and there are a few "professional" writers--meaning they're journalists and writers who have published and been paid larger bucks than the $5 a month they get per subscription on Substack--but I think most
12 comments
Read more

It’s just another day

  Yesterday was the final day of my 8-day assignment in a 4th grade class; I’ve written something about that assignment in a previous post, “Revolt of the Guinea Pig,” It’s been a challenging 8 days which, as Dickens might have said, brought out the best in me and probably the worst in me as well. But yesterday morning I had that experience that every teacher dreads—shelter in place, also known as possible shooter situation. I had arrived at the school at 7:20 thinking how wonderful it was that our heat had broken a bit. The skies were overcast, we’d had rain the day before, there was a cool breeze. As I walked to my classroom (photos below of what the buildings look like), I waved to the students already gathered on the other side of the gate, who were waiting to rush in, some to the cafeteria for their breakfast, some to the playground to run and hopefully get some of that energy out before the bell rang at 7:55. I unlocked the outside door to our building, walked down the corridor t
2 comments
Read more

And now for something a little different from the substitute teaching lens

  I subbed for my daughter yesterday. I wasn’t sure how I’d cope as I am still somewhat jet lagged but she has a very well behaved fifth grade class: they’re respectful, good humored (most of the time) and willing to learn (most of the time). She warned me the night before that there had been some “issues” this week—kids fighting on the playground, some backtalk in class from a boy who’s normally a very hard worker. With that in mind, I started off my day in the classroom addressing this up front. “I hear it’s been a tough week,” I said and then waited for a response. Some shifting in the chair, some rolling of the eyes, a couple of “Yeah, it really has” emanated from the kiddos. I then sat on the corner of my desk and talked about how I remembered being their age, the emotions, how things seem so very important, so very “raw” in the moment. I shared with them how my own teachers reacted to misbehaviors, after-school detention (Wow, Mrs A, AFTER school? They could DO that?) But then I
1 comment
Read more